Reasons to Love You
by musiksnob
Summary: Clare has just started her first year at the University of Toronto when she ends up running into Eli. They rekindle their friendship, but of course, their feelings are never that simple.  A story of two people falling in love for the second time. Eclare
1. Going Away To College

**DISCLAIMER: I don't own Degrassi or anything else.**

**Twitter: themusiksnob / Tumblr: musiksnob**

**Welcome to my new chapter fic. This one will be a little bit lighter than my previous chapter fics. I wanted to explore Eli and Clare about two years from the present season and figure out how they would end up falling in love again.**

**This is set at University of Toronto, but it's completely fictionalized, because I know nothing about the school and there's only so much I can figure out from their website.**

Chapter 1

"Come on, slow poke," Jake teased as I stopped to catch my breath on the landing despite the line of people following me up the stairs. "It's only the fourth floor."

"And it's my tenth trip up to it," I grumbled. It wouldn't have been so bad but I was carrying my heavy laptop bag, a backpack full of literary anthologies and a light but extremely awkward pole lamp.

Jake took pity on me and took the lamp out of my hands, continuing up taking the stairs two at a time. I followed slowly, glad this was the last trip. We arrived at my dorm room and found Mom and Glen talking to a girl who must be my new roommate. We'd been given a 12:00 move in time, but when we made the first trip up, we'd found all of her stuff was already in the room and unpacked. The beds were stacked and she'd already claimed the top bunk.

"Hi!" she chirped once she saw me. "You must be Clare! I'm Mikayla!" She threw her arms around me and I could see Jake smirking at me over her shoulder.

"Hi," I said with decidedly less enthusiasm. I'd received the letter naming her as my roommate about a month ago and she'd tracked me down on Facerange. I couldn't believe that her penchant for following statements with exclamations points actually extended to the real world.

"Mikayla brought a mini-fridge," Mom said with a friendly smile. "Isn't that nice, Clare?"

"Yeah, thanks," I said, turning toward the bag I'd left on my unmade bottom bunk so I could roll my eyes without them noticing.

"If you need to leave, I can help Clare unpack," Mikayla said sweetly. "My parents left about an hour ago, since they have a five hour drive back to Ottawa."

"Oh no," Glen drawled. "We're right across the city. It's not a problem." He picked up the small duffle bag that I was pretty sure was filled with nothing but bras and underwear and I snatched it out of his hand. I'd grown to accept Mom and Glen's relationship, especially since she had finally listened to my words of concern and postponed the wedding for a year to make certain she wasn't rushing into things – but even after a year of living under one roof, I was not letting my new stepdad unpack my underwear.

Jake seemed to pick up on my discomfort. "Why don't we let Clare get set up on her own?"

Mom didn't look convinced. "There's no need for that. We can help out," she reached for a box of books I'd left on my desk chair.

"Mom," I said, wanting this awkward moment to be over with as soon as possible. "I can handle it."

She pursed her lips and nodded, walking over to pull me into a hug. "I can't believe my baby girl is in university. I'm gonna miss you so much."

"Me too," I said. "But I'm coming home in a week for your Labour Day barbeque, so you can't really miss me that much."

She laughed and pulled back just a little, wiping a tear from her eye. "Be good," she warned. "And call me all the time."

Glen gave me a halfhearted wave. "Good luck, Clare Bear," he said, and I fought the urge to wince at the nickname my father had given me as a child.

Jake smirked and ruffled my hair. "See you later, little sis." I rolled my eyes as he followed our parents out the door. It had been awkward in the beginning but by the time our parents had gotten married, we'd long gotten over our puppy love crushes on each other and had become real friends. I didn't appreciate just how quickly he'd taken on the condescending, overprotective brother role – especially since I had a sister just like that even if Darcy hadn't come home from Kenya in four years.

Mikayla watched my family leave, her eyes lingering on Jake's backside. "Is that your brother? Oh. My. God. He is so hot!"

Ugh. "He's my stepbrother."

She laughed. "Ahh, so you aren't related. You could totally hit that."

I grimaced, realizing that I could never tell this girl that I had in fact dated him two years ago before our parents got married. "Gross," I said, as I looked around the piles of boxes, trying to figure out what to unpack first. "He's got a girlfriend anyway," I lied, not wanting her to get any ideas about him. Jake dated a lot of girls but he'd never turned into the boyfriend type, and if she did hook up with him, our rooming situation could get even uglier.

"I've got a boyfriend. Doesn't mean I can't look." Mikayla flopped onto my bed. "I'm glad your parents are gone. I need a cigarette." She pulled one out of a pack from her pocket and I looked at her in alarm.

"You're not going to smoke that in here, are you?" Smoking wasn't allowed in the dorms, but even if it was, there was no way I was going to put up with that.

She gave me a disappointed look. "No, I'm going outside." She walked to the door but turned back to me before exiting. "Don't move any of my stuff."

Great. I thought perky princess was bad enough, but it seemed when parents weren't around Mikayla just turned into a bitch. I found the box that contained my bedding, frowning at the bunk beds. If we had to have bunk beds, I was glad she'd taken the top but I knew I was just clumsy enough that I'd smack my head every morning when my alarm went off.

I had the bed all set up and I was starting to put my clothes into the empty dresser when she returned. "Look who I found!" she said, and I turned to find Jake trailing sheepishly behind her.

"You forgot this," he said, holding out the blanket I must have left on the front seat of his truck.

"Thanks," I said, nodding toward the door. He was oblivious to my gesture.

"So Clare, Jake and his girlfriend just broke up. I guess he forgot to tell you."

There was no hiding it anymore. I shot him a death glare. "That's too bad," I said through gritted teeth. "I'm sure you're very hurt. You'll probably want to be alone for a while."

"Oh, that's such bad advice," she said, moving closer to Jake. "You've got to get right back into the game."

Mikayla was tall and blonde and very pretty and considering I didn't think Jake spent very much time talking to the girls he went out with, she was pretty much exactly his type. "Is that how you met your boyfriend, Mikayla?" I asked sweetly.

Her lips tightened and she took a step back. "Not exactly," she said, and I could tell she'd underestimated me. But she covered her tracks, forcing a bubbly expression back onto her face. "I can't wait for you to meet him. He lives in Ottawa, but he promised me he'd drive down to spend every weekend with me. You're gonna love him."

Every weekend? So not only did I have to put up with Mikayla, but her boyfriend too? Jake couldn't help but laugh at the expression on my face, but when she glanced at him, he covered it with a cough.

"I should really get going. Dad and Helen are waiting," he said, even though we'd taken two cars and I was sure they'd left already. He came over and gave me a hug so he could whisper in my ear. "You can't have your room back. I've already moved all my stuff in."

I pushed him away. He'd spent the past year in the tiny room that my Dad had used as an office, commuting to the local community college so he could take some business classes in hopes of taking over Glen's construction business in a few years. But when I'd decided to live in residence, they had convinced me to let him have my old room.

"Goodbye, Jake."

He walked out chuckling, but a second later, he turned hysterical. "Clare," I heard him call. "Come out here."

I found him practically doubled over, right outside my room. He gestured at the door directly across the hall. It, like the other doors on our floor, had a nameplate made from an old CD with a name scribbled on in Sharpie and Glitter pen. The two on our door said "Clare" and "Mikayla."

This one said "Elijah."

"Look," Jake laughed. "Your ex is stalking you."

I punched Jake in the arm. "You're an ass," I said. "Eli goes to college in Vancouver."

Jake started walking backwards down the hall, still laughing at me. "Just be careful, Clare. You may have a weakness for boys named Elijah."

"Shut up," I said, unable to come up with a witty retort. Jake kept walking, shooting a flirty hello to an attractive brunette as he left me alone, staring at the door.

I couldn't hope but help that the Elijah that lived across the hall from me was ugly and mean and hated puppies and majored in Economics or Chemistry. There was only one Eli that had been in my life, and I was happy to keep it that way.

We had spent the first semester of his senior year avoiding each other, until Adam had sat us down and told us he was tired of having to hang out with each of us separately. We'd agreed to a few Misfits movie dates, and when they went okay, we started having lunch as a group at the Dot. By March, Eli and I had even hung out a few times on our own, and I was starting to wonder if maybe something might happen between us again.

I hadn't had much hope; I knew he was going to UBC for university, and that long distance relationships didn't work under the best of circumstances. But I couldn't hope but wish that our flirty friendship would turn into something more. Then all of a sudden, it was like Eli didn't want to have anything to do with me. It was fine if we were with Adam, but whenever I asked him to get ice cream or coffee, he'd always have plans with Imogen or Fiona.

When I confronted him – not letting on that I'd been having romantic feelings for him again, he told me that things were fine and we were friends, but he seemed a little too happy with himself – as if he'd made it his mission to get me interested in him again and was only too pleased to shoot me down. The final straw was when he invited Imogen to prom as his date. I'd been hoping he'd take me – just as a friend, but he clearly had feelings for her that went beyond that. It was too much to handle and I stopped calling him, spending the summer before my Grade 12 year getting ready for Mom and Glen's Labour Day wedding and trying to pretend that Eli Goldsworthy didn't exist.

Two years later, and it still hurt that he hadn't called me either. We hadn't said a word to each other since his graduation, where Cece had forced us into a photo together and I'd given him a polite "Congratulations."

But I was eighteen now. I was a college student and I was here to get an education. I was leaving the boy drama behind me in high school.

I took one final look at the nameplate before turning back to my room. Evil troll, I repeated to myself. He'll be an evil troll and I won't fall in love with him. I entered the room and found Mikayla looking through my box of DVDs, leaving me with one final wicked thought:

Maybe he'll be so evil I could set him up with my roommate.


	2. Your ExLover is Dead

**DISCLAIMER: I don't own Degrassi or anything else.**

**Twitter: themusiksnob / Tumblr: musiksnob**

**I am SO sorry for how long it took me to write this chapter. I am sticking with this fic, but writing setup isn't always easy and I've got a lot on my mind right now.**

**Thank you so much for the support of this fic. All the reviews and messages I received were so wonderful. I know this idea has been done before, and I'm glad you're all on board with me.**

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><p>Chapter 2<p>

Room 204. Room 204. I walked back and forth between 203 and 205 wondering if I had lost my mind overnight. The only thing on the other side of the hall looked like a fire exit that led to a staircase. I checked my schedule for the sixth time and it was definitely Room 204.

Great. My very first university class and I couldn't even find it. And it wasn't like I hadn't had ample opportunity to get here on time. Mikayla also had a 9:30 class and she'd set her alarm to go off to go off at 6:30. And then hit the snooze button every seven minutes until 8:45. I'd given up trying to sleep by 7 and took a shower, coming back to the room and gritting my teeth every time I heard the loud buzz.

I was already late and starting to panic so I tested the fire door. No alarm went off so I walked to the bottom of the flight of stairs. There was an outside exit, but out of the corner of my eye, I saw a door that was half hidden by the wall of the stairway. Room 204. I breathed a sigh of relief and opened the door, to find ten pairs of eyes looking at me.

"Sorry," I mumbled lamely. It figured that the one class I'd be late for was my First Year Seminar, the only one that wasn't in a large lecture hall or auditorium. The students were seated around a large table and the only empty seat was up next to the professor.

And next to Eli Goldsworthy.

It took all the strength I had not to gasp out loud. I took the seat next to him, trying not to look at him, as the professor said, "Clare Edwards, I presume?"

I nodded, afraid to trust my voice.

"As I was saying before we were interrupted, Dr. Langton has had a family emergency which has forced him to take a last minute sabbatical. Unfortunately, since I was the only professor able to pick up this section and since the romantic poets are not my area of specialty, I will be teaching a second session of my seminar on Sex and Gender is Contemporary Pop Culture.

I tried to follow the professor's words as he went down the syllabus – Dr. Stinson was the name listed at the top – but I couldn't avoid thinking about the fact that Eli and I were sitting less than ten centimeters away from each other. I was trying to force myself to relax and pay attention but it was so difficult.

"I've notified the bookstore and they've placed an order for extra copies of the texts. If you are unable to get the main textbook before next class, there will be a copy on reserve at the main library. You will be expected to have the reading done, so please don't wait until the last minute. You will need to buy the 11th edition; please don't attempt to substitute an earlier edition as many of the chapters have been updated."

I stared at the list of assigned reading. The main textbook appeared to be about 700 pages long and we'd clearly read all of them throughout the semester. There were ten other novels required along with a list of movies and TV shows that we'd need to watch independently. Not only was this class going to be a lot of work but clearly my strategy of coming to campus three weeks early to write down the list of books I'd need for my class to order used online was a waste, because now all the books for my now cancelled class were useless and I couldn't exactly return them.

The assignments sounded pretty reasonable: no final exam or midterm but three research papers and a weekly short reading reaction. The first research paper was due in two weeks but it only needed to be six pages long. The final one was a bit scarier at 15-20 pages, but this was university and I knew I had to get the work done.

Dr. Stinson finished his review of the syllabus and started to lecture. I scribbled notes furiously, writing down as much as I could of what he said. The girl on the other side of Eli had a laptop with her, but I noticed that she was scrolling through Facerange. I kind of figured people in university would be a little more serious about their studies, but clearly I was wrong.

I did really well at Degrassi and I didn't expect there to be such a gap between what I learned in high school and university, but Dr. Stinson kept using words I'd never heard in this context as if we should know what they mean: agency and hegemony and zeitgeist and reification and subaltern. I wasn't even sure if I was spelling some of the words correctly as I wrote them down with large question marks next to them.

And of course, since this class wasn't on Wordsworth and Byron like I had expected, the lecture not only included lots of terms that I was completely comfortable with like transgender or patriarchy but a bunch of sex terms that I'd heard of but certainly hadn't experienced. I knew my cheeks must have been tomato red when the professor used the term "cunnilingus." He was describing a scene from Black Swan which had come out when Eli and I were dating and I vividly remembered watching that scene with wide eyes as Eli stroked my fingers reassuringly.

I wondered if maybe I should try to drop this class and pick up another seminar because between Eli's presence and the topic it just seemed like a bad way to start off my university career. But as I listened to the professor talk, I realized that even if sex wasn't my favorite topic of conversation, it was certainly something I had opinions on, particularly how women's sexuality was treated in literature and television. And for a 9:30 in the morning class, the professor was certainly holding my attention, and he promised in future sessions he would do less talking and open things up to discussion the majority of the time.

By the end of class, I had firmly decided that I was eighteen years old and I was ready to take a university class about sex. I had no idea what to do about the Eli situation. I had sort of glanced at him out of the corner of my eye as a student at the other end of the table spoke. He looked pretty much the same: floppy hair, long eyelashes, black clothing. He wasn't wearing any eyeliner that I could see but he still had his requisite guitar pick necklace which I'd always loved. I kept waiting for him to look at me but his eyes seemed to stay firmly on the professor, his notebook, or his fingernail that he must have colored with a sharpie.

When the professor dismissed us, I barely had a second to pick up my notebook before Eli sprinted from the class, the very first person to leave. I stared after him. Really? I hadn't seen him in over a year and I didn't even merit a, "Hi, Clare, how are you?" I threw my books into my backpack furiously and stalked outside but I didn't see him anywhere.

I was so pissed off that I didn't know what to do. It was too early to get lunch and I didn't have another class until 2 on Tuesdays. I figured I'd head back to the dorms, hoping that Mikayla hadn't slept through her morning class because I'd only been here for three days and I could already use a break from her. I figured I could send Alli an email and freak out over Eli being at U of T.

The First Year Seminar class was in the building next to the student center and I remembered there was a coffee cart near the entrance. After my fitful sleep this morning, I definitely needed some caffeine.

Perhaps unsurprisingly the line for coffee was long, and about five people ahead of me, I noticed Eli. I took a deep breath and tried to get up the nerve to talk to him. I tapped him on the shoulder. "Thanks for saving my place."

He glanced at the people behind him, looking uncomfortable. "Sure," he said.

Ugh, did he lose his ability to speak in the past year? "So how are you?" I asked awkwardly.

Before he could respond, the cashier called us up. "I'll have a large coffee, black," he said before looking over at me helplessly. "She'll have…"

"A small coffee with skim milk and two sugars."

Eli smirked and it felt so comfortable and familiar that it almost made me melt. "I guess I could have guessed that."

"That'll be $4.98," the cashier said, and Eli took out his wallet, fumbling with a few singles.

"Let me," I said, handing her my student ID which also worked as my meal plan card. I wasn't sure if Eli was living on campus and it didn't feel right to force him to pay for my coffee when I was the one who ambushed him.

"Right," he said. "I forgot the coffee cart accepts meal plan."

We stood in silence off to the side as they poured our drinks, and once we received them we sipped the hot beverages gingerly. We exchanged an awkward glance until Eli finally broke the silence. "I'm headed that way," he said, gesturing in the direction of the residence halls.

"Me too," I said.

I was hoping he'd say something else, but I suppose the fact that he was walking with me was a good enough sign. "So you're at U of T now?"

"Yeah," he said, sipping his coffee.

"What happened to UBC?"

I glanced over at him, and watched his face fall. "It just…didn't work out. I was doing pretty well in my classes but everything else wasn't so great and I didn't like being so far away from Bullfrog and Cece, so I transferred."

That made a lot of sense. I was surprised Eli had wanted to go so far away given all he'd been through in high school but he was doing so well in Grade 12 that I figured he'd be ready for it. "So you've been back all summer?"

Eli looked even more uncomfortable. "Not exactly. I only finished one semester there. I flew back after Christmas break and got my stuff and moved back to Toronto. But I spent the summer in New York City so I haven't really been around the whole time."

He'd been back since January? "Why didn't you tell me?" I couldn't believe Eli had been in Toronto for half a year and I hadn't run into him at the Dot or he hadn't texted or emailed to let me know. Things had ended awkwardly between us but even so…

"I meant to call," he said, and I got the feeling he was brushing me off. "But I was pretty busy. Bullfrog got me a job at the station and I worked a lot of hours and then I went to New York so I wasn't around much."

I remembered that Imogen had gone to NYU and wondered if he'd spent the summer with her. But _that_ was a question I was definitely not going to ask. I still couldn't believe that I hadn't run into him at all. And how come Adam didn't say anything? He and I had spent a ton of time together last year. But suddenly the many times that Adam had blown me off and claimed to have plans with Dave or Drew started to make sense.

"You were Adam's secret girlfriend," I said, and Eli practically choked on his coffee.

"Excuse me?"

"You were Adam's secret girlfriend," I repeated, a little less accusingly. "All last semester he kept blowing me off and he was such a bad liar that I thought that maybe he'd found a girlfriend that he was too scared to introduce me to. But clearly instead of making out with some girl, he was spending time with you."

Eli laughed. "Yes. No making out going on there."

Eli seemed to think it was a joke, but none of this was making sense to me. "Why didn't Adam tell me he was hanging out with you?"

His laughter immediately stopped. "Because I asked him not to."

"But why would you do that?"

"Look, things weren't exactly great between us when I left for Vancouver. We didn't speak all summer. I thought that things between the two of us were just kind of done."

He wasn't saying anything I didn't already know but hearing the words out loud just felt…heartbreaking. "Well, we've got a class together now. I think we can act like adults and not avoid each other."

"Sure," Eli said quickly and I was starting to feel a little better.

We kept walking and I was expecting him to break off at some point but he stayed in step next to me, and I wondered if he was being polite and going to walk me to my dorm so we could continue our conversation.

"So what did you think of the seminar?" I glanced over and saw Eli's grin.

"It was…interesting," I stuttered. "Not exactly the romantic poets."

"Not exactly," he repeated with laughter in his voice. "Sounded interesting though. I've got some of the TV shows we need to watch on DVD if you want to borrow them."

"Sounds good," I said, surprised at how friendly he was being after he had tried to avoid me.

We reached the door to my dorm and paused. "I guess I better…" I gestured upstairs and Eli laughed.

"You live here too?"

My jaw dropped as I finally put the clues together. "You're Elijah," I said, shaking my head. Jake's stupid joke from move in day didn't seem quite so funny anymore.

Eli made a face. "Yes Clare, although I think we established the fact that I prefer to be called Eli a couple of years ago."

"No, I mean. You're Elijah. You live in the room across from me."

Eli narrowed his eyes at me, and I opened the door in exasperation. He followed me up the stairs and his jaw dropped when he realized what I had meant. "Clare and Mikayla," he read off my door. "Mikayla," he repeated. "Tall, blonde and..."

"She has a boyfriend," I said bitterly. If Eli fell for her, I would seriously lose my mind.

"I was going to say bitchy," Eli laughed.

"Yep, that's her," I said.

"Lucky you," he said, unlocking his door. "That's why I got a single." He gazed at me for a second. "It's nice to see you, Clare." His voice turned husky when he said my name and I turned to unlock my door so he wouldn't see the flush that rushed to my cheeks.

"You too, Eli," I said softly. I turned around to give him a quick smile. "See you on Thursday."

He grinned and shut his door behind him and I did the same, throwing myself onto my bed.

Eli Goldsworthy. In my class. In my dorm.

I was so screwed.


	3. Center of Gravity

**DISCLAIMER: I don't own Degrassi or anything else.**

**Twitter: themusiksnob / Tumblr: musiksnob**

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><p>Chapter 3<p>

It was ten o'clock on a Monday night and I'd been tied to my computer for the past two hours, trying to finish up my first paper for my First Year Seminar. I'd started the research for it almost two weeks ago, but between my reading and assignments for all of my classes, I'd only gotten about half of it written this weekend. Fortunately, Mikayla had a night class on Mondays and seemed to go out for dinner and drinks afterward, because I really couldn't take any distractions right now.

I'd drank a ton of coffee to make sure I could stay up as late as I needed to, so I was wiggling in my chair between the caffeine and the fact that I had to pee. I changed into my pajamas and headed down to the washroom, figuring I could postpone showering until after the seminar tomorrow. I briefly debated the wisdom of having Eli see me unshowered tomorrow, but considering half the people in my class showed up in pajamas I figured one week of slightly dingy hair wouldn't be the end of the world.

The girls' washroom was directly across from the guys' and as soon as I walked out of the door, so did Eli. Except he was only wearing a towel around his waist, and his hair was dripped into his eyes, and his bare chest was…

"Hey," he said, smirking at me and I forced myself to meet his eyes as we started walking back toward our rooms.

"Hey," I repeated, feeling foolish. "How's your paper going?"

"Not great," he groaned. "I'm only halfway done. How about you?"

"I just have the conclusion left."

"Lucky," he said.

"Maybe if you weren't such a procrastinator…" I teased.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," he said. "Good luck."

He closed his door behind him, presumably to get dressed, but I left mine open. It seemed to me like Eli was never in his room – not that I kept tabs on his whereabouts but considering this was the first time I'd even run into him on the way back from the washroom we must have very different schedules. I'd occasionally come back from class to hear a few familiar strains of Dead Hand songs coming through his closed door, but he never kept his door open like the rest of the hall did.

I kept glancing over to see if maybe Eli had opened his door after getting dressed but he hadn't. I tried to put my headphones on and concentrate on finishing up my paper, but it was hard to get Eli out of my mind. Especially wet, half-naked Eli. I hadn't seen him like that when we were dating and the part of me that got a little less repressed after my parents' divorce was really kicking myself. He hadn't changed much; maybe he's grown an inch or so and his frame was still slender, though I could see his flat stomach was hiding a little bit of muscle tone I hadn't realized he'd had. He'd never be a bulky, muscular guy but I liked that about him. He was more brains than brawn but I couldn't get the sight of his chest and stomach out of my mind. Especially the small trail of hair from his belly button that led to…

Focus, Clare. Back to the project. I forced myself to keep typing, balancing the book on my lap so I could copy the quotation I wanted to use.

_At the end of Chamber of Secrets, Dumbledore tells Harry, "It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities" (333). While this statement in itself subverts the classical paradigm of the physically and mentally gifted hero, it holds deeper significance of the trio's relationship._

It took me an embarrassingly long amount of time to finish, since I kept having Eli on the brain. But I wrote a conclusion that didn't seem too trite and went back through the paper, combing line by line for typos and grammatical errors. I didn't want my first university paper to be an embarrassment.

By the time I finished my work cited, it was 11:30. Mikayla still hadn't come back and I figured if I got to sleep before her return, I might get lucky and sleep through her late night phone call to her boyfriend. I didn't quite understand why she needed to talk to him _every_ night, especially since he had only left that morning from their weekend together. It had only been two weekends so far but I was really sick of having to waste my weekend away in the main campus library to avoid the two of them.

I went to check my email one more time since I had closed out the browser to avoid distractions when an IM popped up on my screen.

**Eli-gold49: How's your paper going?**

I blinked at the screen. After his graduation I'd removed Eli from my buddy list in hopes of forgetting him. I glanced over at his door but it was still completely closed.

**Clare-e23: All finished. Yours?**

**Eli-gold49: Ugh. I'm a page short and I've got nothing left to write.**

**Clare-e23: Try some block quotes. Those always take up a lot of space.**

**Eli-gold49: LOL. If I put in any more block quotes, there aren't going to be any original words in this thing.**

I bit my lip. It was already late and if he was completely out of ideas, he was in bad shape.

**Clare-e23: Do you want me to give it a read? See if I can come up with any ideas?**

It took a full minute for him to respond. I wondered if I had somehow crossed a line that we weren't supposed to be crossing.

**Eli-gold49: Sure, if you don't mind. Do you still use the same email address?**

**Clare-e23: Yeah and it's no problem.**

A minute later, my email notifier popped up just as he IMed me again to say "sent." I opened up his document, curious about what he had written about. Since I focused on gender for my paper, I'd completely forgotten that Eli's could be about sex – which was probably not something I could give him any advice on. But I was intrigued to see that he also focused on gender by writing about portrayals of transgender characters on scripted television.

I'd read lots of Eli's creative writing in high school but I'd never read anything he'd written academically. It was very impressive overall. I turned on the track changes feature on Microsoft Word, but I only made a few comments about word choice or spelling. His only flaw was that he did have a tendency to be a bit wordy; there was one sentence that had so many clauses in it that I was pretty sure he'd need to put in about six periods to make it grammatically correct.

I could see how Eli was having trouble reaching the page requirement. Writing about portrayals of gender in the Harry Potter series was a pretty safe topic; I could have gone beyond Ron and Hermione to any number of characters to lengthen things. But there were only two examples of transgender characters on TV: a MTF adult woman on Dirty Sexy Money who I wasn't familiar with and a teenage FTM on the show Westdrive.

I actually had to hold back some laughter thinking of Eli watching the trashy teen soap that was very issue of the week. Alli had been a huge fan at Degrassi and I'd seen some episodes with Darcy, so I was pretty familiar with the character's storyline. But Eli seemed to know every detail.

I had just reached the end, and seen Eli's pleading note at the bottom: "HELP ME! WHAT ELSE CAN I WRITE?"

I was typing up a response when I heard his voice in my doorway. "That bad, eh?"

He startled me a bit and I took a deep breath before I stopped typing and looked over at him. "No, the opposite, actually. It's really good."

"Uh huh. That's why you've got the patented Clare Edwards comments that are about as long as the original work going on."

I rolled my eyes. "I only put in…" I squinted at the monitor. "Eight comments. Mostly typos or little things. There's not a lot to change."

"Anything that'll buy me another 300 words?"

"Actually, I do have an idea." I gestured for him to sit down in Mikayla's computer chair and he rolled it a little closer to me. "It was interesting for me to read this because I haven't really read your academic writing before. And it is really good, Eli. I particularly like how you seem to have every episode of Westdrive memorized," I teased.

He made a face. "Cece makes me watch it with her. She loves that show."

"Suuure, blame it on Cece." He shot me a dirty look. "Anyway, the thing I always liked about your creative writing was just how much of yourself you put into this. And this is really strong, but it's lacking a little bit of the personal touch."

Eli looked confused. "I'm not following."

"You've run out of things to say because there are only two transgender characters on TV, right?" He nodded. "Maybe in your introduction and conclusion you could compare them to someone who isn't on tv."

It took him a second to catch on, but I could see his face light up a little. "You mean, write about Adam?"

"How many people have a transgender best friend? And clearly his experience wasn't exactly the same as Jayden's on Westdrive."

Jayden was bullied almost constantly throughout the run of the show, while Adam had only faced physical violence when he first came to Degrassi. He had to deal with a few insensitive people over time, but overall, he was pretty well-liked and accepted, especially when he and Dave were doing the radio show.

But of course, for TV, Jayden's run on the show had him choosing between two girls who'd fought over him for a year. Adam had lots of friends and he'd briefly had a girlfriend in Fiona, but he'd never quite found someone who could accept him for who he was when it came to romance.

"That's a great idea!" Eli said, standing up. "Send me your comments; I want to finish this up so I can attempt to get a few hours sleep before class." He got to the door before turning around. "Thanks, Clare. Really. You've been a tremendous help."

"You're welcome," I said, turning to the screen so he couldn't see just how happy his comments had made me. "I'm here anytime."

I could resist a final glance at him, pleased to see he was shooting me a grin before turning back to his room. He closed the door behind him but it didn't feel quite as final.

I sent him the document and printed out my own essay. I was about to shut down when I saw the IM box still open at the bottom of the screen. I was feeling a little bit brave so I sent him one more message.

**Clare-e23: Good luck with your paper. Hope you get some sleep. I'll bring you some coffee to class tomorrow so you don't pass out during Stinson's lecture.**

I waited a minute just to see if he'd reply, and my finger had almost clicked on shut down when my computer beeped in response.

**Eli-gold49: You're the best. Goodnight!**

I fell asleep that night with a grin on my face – the first time I'd been truly happy since coming to U of T.


	4. The Laws Have Changed

**DISCLAIMER: I don't own Degrassi or anything else.**

**Twitter: themusiksnob / Tumblr: musiksnob**

**I cannot even begin to thank you for all of your support on this fic. Everytime I update and read my reviews and comments it really makes me smile.**

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><p>Chapter 4<p>

It was Friday night and after class I'd stopped by the cafeteria to get an early dinner. I was hoping to get back to the room before Mikayla's boyfriend arrived. If I thought she was bad enough alone, the two of them together was unbearable. I couldn't believe that he had driven down from Ottawa every weekend since school had started. The first weekend he'd been there I'd tried to make conversation but the only thing I'd gleaned was that he was 22 and had dropped out of university after his first year. He was unemployed and living with his parents – which I supposed explained why he was so eager to come down and see Mikayla every weekend.

Neither of them seemed to give even a second's worth of consideration to how that might make me feel. The best case scenario was that they went out clubbing because that usually meant I could get in a few hours of sleep before they got home, loud and sloppy drunk. But the fact that neither of them had much money usually meant they curled up on her bed watching illegally downloaded movies on her laptop, leaving me to go to the library to avoid listening to them baby talk to each other.

I was sitting there eating my pasta while doing some reading for my philosophy class. It was a little early to be eating dinner especially on a Friday night, but I could see all around me people in couples or large groups, laughing and joking as they ate. I wasn't sure quite what I was doing so wrong. I wasn't exactly outgoing; even at Degrassi I'd found my first friends because Darcy had introduced me to Alli and Mr. Simpson had introduced me to Connor. But it seemed like everyone had buddied up with their roommate and become friends with other people from there.

I'd pretty much buddied up with my school work.

After a few more bites, I felt so awkward sitting by myself that I gave up and headed back to the dorm. While I walked, I fantasized that Mikayla would tell me she and Greg had broken up…or even better, that she'd flunked out of school and was moving back to Ottawa. It was starting to get a little chilly but my happy thoughts helped keep me warm.

Of course, I wasn't so lucky. When I got back to my room, Mikayla was nowhere to be found, but Greg was there, sitting on _my_ bed, smoking. I took a few steps into the room and wrinkled my nose as I realized that it wasn't just a cigarette.

"Hey Clare," he said in his dreamy stoner voice. "Want a hit?"

"No thanks," I said bitterly. So much for having the room to myself. I started tossing textbooks into my backpack, preparing to spend yet another Friday night at the library. "I thought we agreed you would smoke outside," I said. I hated confrontation but I couldn't overlook the fact that he was using illegal drugs not only in my room but on my bed.

"Sorry bro," he said. "I didn't want to get caught." He paused, deep in thought as I unlocked my laptop from my desk. "It's cool; I can go out on the balcony."

I stared at him for a moment before realizing that by balcony, he meant the three feet of concrete underneath our window that was meant to be decorative but really just meant the rooms on the floors below ours were slightly larger. I was pretty sure I was supposed to be discouraging my roommate's stoned boyfriend from climbing out a window, but I just wanted him gone so bad I said, "You do that."

He didn't move and I realized he was sitting on my sweatshirt. I tugged it out from under him, feeling more and more angry the more I was in the room with him. "See you later," I said angrily and grabbed my bulging backpack.

I slammed the door behind me and leaned back against it. "ARGHGHGG," I howled in frustration.

"Everything okay over there?"

Eli was sitting at his computer desk, directly in front of his open door. He was sipping a bottle of beer and looked really amused.

"You don't even want to know," I said, walking over and leaning against his doorjamb.

"What's with the bag? Thinking of running away?"

I hoisted the heavy bag a little higher on my shoulder. "Nope. Just some roommate avoidance homework at the library."

Eli looked disappointed. "You can't spend Friday night at the library."

There was no way I was admitting that I'd spent every Friday night of university thus far at the library. "I don't really have anywhere else to go," I admitted.

He gestured into his room. "You could hang out with me."

I wasn't sure what Eli did during his free time, but I was pretty sure he didn't ever spend his Friday nights alone in his room. "Are you sure? I don't want to intrude."

"It's fine," he said. "I wanted to take a break tonight and just hang out here."

"If you'd rather be alone…." I said, hesitating again.

"Clare," he said firmly. "Have a seat."

Eli's single was pretty tiny. His door was opposite mine but what would have been the other half of the room was taken up by the trash room. To get to his bed – the only other place to sit down besides the desk chair he was currently occupying – I only narrowly avoided knocking him in the head with my stuffed bookbag.

He turned to me in amusement as I dumped my stuff on the floor and sat down on his bed. "Clare Edwards," he said, pausing for dramatic effect. "Do you smell like marijuana?" he asked in mock horror.

I brought my sweatshirt up to my nose and groaned. "My roommate's boyfriend," I explained. "Guess why I can't stay home tonight."

He gave me a sympathetic look. "That must suck."

"He's been here every weekend since school started."

Eli nodded sympathetically. I could tell he didn't really know what to say, and neither did I. He turned back to his laptop and I took the opportunity to look around his room. I recognized a few of the rock posters on his walls from his old room. The dorm room seems pretty uncluttered though, and I wondered how difficult it was for him to leave his many belongings at home. His closet door was open and I could see the box of important mementos he'd started putting together back when we were still dating was on the top shelf. I wondered if he'd kept anything that reminded him of me in there or if he'd gotten rid of them after how terribly our relationship ended.

Out of the corner of my eye, I watched Eli drinking a beer. There was another one on his desk, presumably empty. I didn't realize he drank, which was probably kind of ridiculous, considering he was 19 now and it was perfectly legal. He caught me looking at him and I tried to look away and act nonchalant.

"I'm sorry; do you want anything?" he asked politely. "I mostly have beer but I think there's some orange juice left in the fridge if you want some."

"I didn't know you drank so much," I commented, annoyed at myself for sounding judgmental.

Eli didn't seem notice. "I don't. That's why there's so much in there."

I was a little thirsty so I leaned across the room and opened the fridge to find a half-empty container of orange juice that hadn't expired. "Why do you have orange juice?" I asked, the carton looking odd in the sea of bottles.

He smirked. "Well, I usually mix it with vodka," he said, handing me a relatively clean looking plastic cup. I noticed the bottle of vodka he was referring to crammed in the small freezer section of his mini-fridge. He turned back to his laptop, and I poured myself some orange juice, daring to pour some vodka into the cup as well.

I sat back down on his bed and took a sip, narrowly avoiding spitting it out as I coughed down the liquor. "Wow," I said finally. "That was stronger than I thought."

"The orange juice?" Eli asked in amusement.

"The vodka I poured in it."

I don't think I'd ever seen Eli look so astonished. "You're just full of surprises tonight," he said, standing up to close the door. He answered my look of confusion. "You're underage. I don't really feel like getting hassled for corrupting a minor."

"Shut up," I said, taking another sip. This wasn't my first time drinking. I'd had two Mike's Hard Lemonades in the hotel room Alli and I had gotten after prom. We'd lied to our parents and told them we were staying at each other's houses and then alternated using the room to have a little bit of alone time with our boyfriends.

And then at the end of the summer when both Dave and Liam had decided to end our relationships on the same day, claiming that long distance relationships never worked anyway, Alli and I had shared an entire bottle of wine we'd stolen from my Dad's apartment as we commiserated over getting dumped and going away to separate universities. But I'd never had hard liquor before tonight and I could already feel my cheeks flushing.

Eli was smiling softly at me. "I wouldn't have thought of you as a drinker."

"Why?" I challenged. "Because I never do anything wrong?"

His smile changed into a smirk. "Because I would have thought you'd prefer your drinks to be _virgin_," he joked, though he turned away as soon as he said that and I heard him mutter to himself, "but maybe not anymore."

"Excuse me?" I said, my voice raising in anger. "What's that supposed to mean?"

He looked chagrined. "I noticed…it wasn't like I was looking for it or anything, but in class the other day, you were talking and you were waving your hands around," he mimicked what that looked like. "And I just happened to notice you weren't wearing your ring anymore."

I gaped at him, trying to figure out how to respond to that, when he waved me off. "You don't have to explain. It's none of my business." He took a long swig of his beer before continuing. "I mean, I'm obviously not going to judge you for that; you know, it's your decision, and as long as you were with…someone you cared about…a boyfriend or whatever...that's totally fine." I could see some pain lurking behind his eyes. "I mean unless you were with like 20 guys and you don't even know their names, then I might judge you, but mostly because it's you and I know you're not like that." He laughed, trying to play his words off as a joke to lighten the mood but I could tell that it really did pain him to think that I might have slept with someone else.

I decided to put him out of his misery. "This is exactly why I stopped wearing the ring."

"Sorry?" he asked, reaching into the fridge to pull out another beer.

"I didn't want people to have opinions about whether I had sex or didn't have sex or why I might choose to wait or not. In high school, if I had taken the ring off, everyone would have made assumptions about me. I figured university was a good place to start over so I stopped wearing the ring because it's nobody's business but mine whether or not I've had sex."

I took another swig of my drink. "Which I haven't," I admitted. I wasn't sure why it was so important to me that Eli knew the truth, but I knew it was something I needed to share with him.

Eli tried to cover the look of relief on his face by taking another drink. "Are you still waiting for marriage? Or just for the right guy?" he asked, his tone soft and genuine.

"I don't know," I said honestly. "I'd like to wait for marriage, but after my parents…I just don't feel as strongly about marriage as an institution as I used to. I mean, you could wait until you marry someone you love and then twenty years later find out they're cheating on you after you've given your whole life to them. I'm not sure that makes sense anymore."

"You'll know," Eli said astutely. "When it's the right person, you'll know whether it's going to be forever or not. And then it won't matter whether you wait or not, because forever is forever…no matter where it starts."

I looked at the kind, wise boy sitting across the room from me and wanted to throw my arms around him. He'd grown so much since our relationship and I wanted to know everything about what made him the person he was today. But that was too much for right now and I was starting to feel a little tipsy so set my drink down on his nightstand and I decided to go the joking route.

"Besides whenever I do decide to 'do it,' I'll be totally well-prepared."

Eli raised an eyebrow. "Oh yeah? How's that?"

I flopped down on my back against his pillow. "My roommate's been having sex three feet above my head every weekend for the past month. I'm practically an expert."

Eli cracked up, grabbing his beer bottle and moving across the room to sit down on the edge of the bed, facing me. "Oh Clare," he said. "That's just awful."

I sat up and leaned toward him conspiratorially. "The only good thing is that he must be terrible at it because it really doesn't last very long."

Eli guffawed. "That's just wrong."

"Wrong is having sex on a top bunk when your roommate is sleeping below you."

He covered his face. "My roommate at UBC did that to me once, but at least it wasn't bunk beds. He brought some girl home with him from a bar one night. I don't think I'll ever get those sounds out of my head." He laughed. "She was pretty hot though."

I grabbed his arm. "Ewww, did you watch them?"

"No!" he said, and I pulled my arm away, a little embarrassed that I had touched him. "She was still there the next morning. I spent the night with my blankets over my head, wishing I hadn't left my noise cancelling headphones with a cute girl in Toronto."

I blushed even more than the alcohol's effects. "I have them at my mom's house. I should give them back to you."

He shook his head. "Nah, it's fine. Though sometimes I wish I had them when the girl next door is having sex. Have you ever heard her?"

"Yes!" I exclaimed. "She is so freaking loud."

"And so fake," he said.

"Really?" I said, not sure how he could tell.

"Definitely," he said emphatically. "Unless she starts orgasming from the moment a guy looks at her, there's no way she's enjoying it _that_ much for two hours in a row without pause."

"Wow," I said. "Yeah, that does seem unreasonable."

We were silent for a moment and then Eli looked at me, his own face flushed. "I think you and I are the only ones here who aren't having sex."

My eyes widened and even he looked shocked those words came out of his mouth. "Sorry!" he said quickly. "I wasn't trying to proposition you or anything."

"It's fine, Eli," I said, finishing up my drink to give me something to do other than look at him awkwardly.

But he still looked embarrassed. "Man, I spend one summer in New York with a recovering alcoholic and all of a sudden I'm a lightweight again. Two and a half beers and I'm making you uncomfortable."

"It's fine," I repeated, but Eli moved off the bed and back to his desk chair though he turned to face me.

I knew we needed to change the subject. "So you were with Fiona in New York City this summer? What were you doing?"

His face lit up. "Her mother's best friend is a literary agent with a fairly big, reputable agency and she helped hook me up with an internship. I got a lot of coffee but she let me read the slush pile and it was a really great experience."

"That sounds amazing."

"It was," he said bursting with enthusiasm. "Living in New York was amazing and this is definitely the career path I want to go down while I work on my own writing. I added a business minor to my English major so I can learn more about contracts and marketing and stuff."

As someone who'd declared an English major but had no idea what I was going to do with it, a game plan sounded incredible. "That's great, Eli. I'm really happy for you. Do you think you want to move to NYC permanently?"

He shrugged. "Well, after spending the summer at the Coyne penthouse, I'm not sure I'll ever be able to live like a peasant again," he joked. "But it's something I could do here or there or really anywhere. I like keeping my options open."

I was glad to hear he'd spent the summer living with Fiona. I didn't know her very well but I knew she'd been a good friend to Eli – and I hated to admit it but the fact that she was a lesbian and I knew there wasn't anything romantic between them was a plus.

"Did you see Imogen while you were in the city?" I asked, trying to keep my voice casual as I avoided his gaze.

"Yeah, she was taking summer classes so we went out to dinner a few times and saw a couple shows. My job kept me pretty busy though."

I couldn't quite figure out the answer to the question I hadn't asked and I was glad when Eli offered the information on his own. "We're just friends. Imogen and me. We're not together."

"Okay," I said, wishing there was something left in my drink, so I had an excuse to look away. "Not that it's any of my business," I said softly, repeating his words from earlier.

Eli looked like he wanted to say something when we heard a loud banging in the hallway. "Campus police. Open up."

Eli and I jumped up. He hid the empty beer bottles and my cup in the closet, pulling the doors shut. The stuff that was in the fridge he could legally have since he was 19, but drinking wasn't allowed if there was an underage person in the room. We opened up the door but discovered we weren't the police's target.

An officer led Greg out of my dorm room in handcuffs. "I didn't do anything," he said.

"We found you on a fourth floor ledge smoking an illegal substance," the officer stated.

Mikalya followed him out of the room. She had tears running down her cheeks. "Clare!" she said when she saw me. "Don't worry! This is all a misunderstanding. We'll get Greg back from jail no problem."

We watched them get onto the elevator down the hall.

"Wow," Eli said.

"I guess I can go back to my room," I said, feeling a little disappointed after spending such a nice night with Eli. I grabbed my backpack and sweatshirt and met him in the doorway. "Thanks for letting me hang out here."

"Anytime," he said, his face a little closer to mine than I would have expected. "And Clare?"

I raised my eyebrows, waiting for him to continue. "If the warden doesn't allow them a conjugal visit before he posts bail and you need to escape, my floor is always open."

I looked down at the floor next to his bed. "What a gentleman," I said, pretending to swoon. "You don't even have a carpet."

He grinned. "At least you wouldn't have to worry about sex juices dripping down on you in the middle of the night."

I cringed, though I smirked when I came up with the perfect retort. "Knowing you? The chances are probably about the same."

"Ouch," he said, laughing. "Goodnight, Clare."

Our mouths were only a few inches apart and I willed him to kiss me. But he stayed exactly where he was and I wasn't brave or drunk enough to cross the threshold. "Goodnight, Eli."


	5. Friend is a Four Letter Word

**DISCLAIMER: I don't own Degrassi or anything else.**

**Twitter: themusiksnob / Tumblr: musiksnob**

**Thanks again for all of your support. It really means everything. Things are still a little rocky in my life right now and every time I open up my email and have another review, it really makes my day.**

**I'm sorry it's been taking me so long to update. Some chapters are easy and some are really tough to write.**

**Thanks to Sarenka222 for helping me with this.**

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><p>Chapter 5<p>

I'd been waiting outside my dorm for Jake to pick me up for almost 20 minutes. I was headed home for a night since my grandmother was coming up for a visit and I hadn't seen her since graduation.

The trip home also had the added benefit of getting me away from Mikayla for the night. After Greg's arrest for pot possession, he was banned from campus and since Mikayla didn't have a car, she couldn't drive to Ottawa to visit him. So even though he wasn't around every weekend, she spent every waking moment on the phone or on Skype with him – which meant that most of my would-be sleeping moments were now spent holding a pillow over my ears.

A trip home also meant I could bring Eli's noise cancelling headphones back to school with me.

My phone buzzed in my jeans pocket and I grabbed it, fully expecting it to be Jake apologizing for being late. But it wasn't the generic ringtone I used for almost everyone on my phone list. It was David Bowie's Space Oddity which meant it was Liam calling.

We hadn't spoken since our breakup in August, but this was the third time he had called me in as many days. And just like the last two times, I ignored his call.

We had started dating in February of Grade 12 after Alli set us up, since he was friends with Dave and Adam from the radio station and she was tired of being the third wheel to their bromance. Liam had matured a lot from the time I foolishly kissed him at the date night when I was angry at Jake, and he'd learned how to have conversations about things besides music. I knew I wasn't in love with him and it was clear he felt the same way but it was nice to have a date to all the senior dances and parties.

We both worked over the summer but we'd spent plenty of time together both in groups and just the two of us. We went to movies and he dragged me to concerts and we were practically a fixture at the front table at the Dot, sipping coffee in contented companionship.

Even though it wasn't an epic romance for the ages, it was nice and comfortable. And for that reason, I hadn't realized that it had an expiration date. So when Liam took me out the night before he left for the University of Texas at Austin and explained that he didn't want to go to college with a girlfriend and that he wanted to stay friends, I was shocked. If he'd really wanted to end things before university, he should have discussed it with me in the months before rather than resorting to a last second break up. If I had some time to think about it, I probably would have agreed that a Texas-Toronto long distance relationship was a foolish idea, particularly since we weren't head over heels in love with each other. But his sudden announcement left me stunned and annoyed; maybe things weren't magical between us, but I didn't see a reason to end something that was still good.

And it would have been nice to have him on my side during those first few weeks of university, when I was trying to get my bearings. Since not much had improved in the meantime, I still wished I could call him and hear his voice just to ease some of the loneliness I felt when sitting in the cafeteria, eating dinner by myself for the umpteenth time.

Mostly, though, I was surprised at how much I _didn't_ miss him. How we'd spent months in each other's company but I could go days without even thinking about him. And when I did, it was only a feeling of nostalgia, not really a desire to be with him.

But now he was trying to call me, and I didn't want to talk to him. I didn't want to make nice and ask him about his classes and tell him amusing stories about my roommate. And I really didn't want to tell him just how bad things were going for me – how I felt friendless and lost on this huge campus. How I'd gotten a C on my first biology test even though I'd studied for hours. How I spent nights in my room starting at the door across the hall, hoping that my ex would talk to me.

If things were going well for me, I'd definitely be ready to be Liam's friend; I certainly didn't want to be his long distance girlfriend anymore. But I wasn't willing to let him see what a mess he'd left behind.

"Running away again?" I heard Eli call behind me.

I pulled up the drawstring of my laundry bag and laughed, "Nah, just going home for the night for family dinner. Figured I'd knock out some laundry while I was there."

He smiled, "I snuck home for a few hours last weekend and Cece had missed me so much that she volunteered to do my laundry. I'm gonna have to go visit her more often."

"Yeah, I haven't been home since Labour Day and I'm running out of quarters."

"I'm sure it'll be nice to spend a night in your own bed. Especially since Mikayla won't be there."

I laughed, though with Grandma visiting, I knew I'd be stuck on the couch unless Jake decided to be uncharacteristically chivalrous and give me my old room for the night. "Yeah, getting away from her is a big plus."

Eli looked thoughtful. "I thought it would be better once her boyfriend got banned from campus."

"Sort of," I said. "Though it's just meant she's had to have phone sex instead of actual sex, which you'd think would be an improvement, but at least when he was here they'd try to keep it quiet."

He laughed and squeezed my shoulder, bringing a small blush to my face. "It's too bad you're going home," Eli said, and I looked at him curiously. "I was just about to see if you wanted to grab some dinner."

We'd eaten dinner or lunch together a few times since the night we hung out in his room. The company was nice and it was fun to be around him, but I wondered what it would take for us to become real friends again, rather than just acquaintances who occasionally grabbed a bite to each together.

"Sorry," I said. "I've got a hot date." He raised his eyebrows and I grinned. "My grandma's going to be there."

He laughed. "Ah, so both the food and the company are going to be better. I see I can't compete with that."

For the first time I was disappointed that I was heading home. I really wished I could spend another dinner with Eli – and since it was a Saturday and not a school night, perhaps suggest we watch one of the movies for our seminar together. I realized that it had been Eli who had initiated all of our meals together except for one when I'd found him sitting alone and joined him, and thought maybe I needed to take the lead. "I'll be back in time for dinner tomorrow if you don't have any plans."

He looked pleased. "I don't, so that would be great. Especially if you steal me a piece of your mom's apple pie."

I smiled. Eli hadn't eaten dinner with my mother since I was in Grade 10, so it was nice to hear that he remembered that particular detail. "I'll do my best."

Jake's truck pulled up in front of us and he honked the horn obnoxiously even though he could clearly see I was standing right there. I leaned down to pick up my laundry bag and turned to say goodbye to Eli. He was glaring at Jake, his jaw tight and unhappy, and I wasn't sure why things had changed.

"I'll see you tomorrow, Eli."

He didn't respond, and I felt even more confused. I tossed my laundry bag onto the floor and waved at Eli. He gave a tentative wave back and I felt a little better.

"Thanks for being a half hour late, jerkhead," I said to Jake, giving him a kiss on the cheek to show him I wasn't too mad. After all, it did give me the opportunity to not only talk to Eli but set up another time for us to hang out.

"Clare, Clare, Clare," Jake admonished as he pulled away from the curb. "What did I tell you about falling for Eli again?"

"What? No! We're just friends," I explained, annoyed that Jake seemed so negative about even the possibility of me getting back together with Eli.

"Just friends?" Jake grumbled. "Like that's possible."

"Says the ex who's now my brother."

"That's different," Jake insisted.

"So you're saying if our parents didn't get married, you never would have spoken to me again?"

"I'm saying that you and I didn't have the kind of feelings for each other that you had for Eli. Things were intense and he broke your heart." He took his eyes of the road to give me a sympathetic look. "I'm just looking out for you, Clare."

"Well you can save it because we're just friends." And since he was pretty much my only friend right now, I wasn't going to do anything to screw that up.

Jake didn't look convinced but I shot him a death glare and he kept his mouth shut for the rest of the ride home.

Dinner with the family was tough – a lot of pretending that university was the greatest thing in the world. But it was nice to see Grandma and Jake kept his mouth shut about my friendship with Eli, so it wasn't too bad. By the end of family board game night I was actually feeling pretty comfortable and didn't even grumble when I had to set up for the night on the living room couch.

I woke up early to the sound of Grandma making coffee in the kitchen, and though she apologized profusely and tried to keep quiet, there was no way I could get back to sleep. I sat down with her at the kitchen island and she asked me a lot of questions about how I was doing – clearly not believing the sunny picture I had drawn the night before.

I decided to be honest and tell her about my difficult roommate and my seeming inability to make new friends. She already knew about my breakup with Liam, but I hadn't told her about how Alli had been out of touch since she started pledging a sorority and how Adam seemed to think a few tweets were all that was needed to sustain a friendship.

She asked me if there were any new boys in my life, and I tried to talk about a cute boy in my philosophy class, but I could tell she wasn't buying it. I'd never been able to hide anything from Grandma, so I gave in and told her about Eli and my confusion over my feelings for him. She reminded me of a similar conversation we had during Christmas break in Grade 10 – when the violence of Vegas Night left me unsure of pursuing a relationship with Eli. She had been the one who supported me giving him another chance then, and told me this time, whether I wanted to be friends with him or something more, I had her blessing.

Family breakfast turned into family lunch and I was itching to get back to school in time to have dinner with Eli. I kept dropping hints about how much schoolwork I had to do, but no one seemed to notice. Finally I pulled my mother aside and told her I had a date. She offered to drive me back to campus so she could pepper me with questions about the guy which I answered as honestly as I could. Even though I couldn't tell her the truth that it was just a casual dinner with Eli, it was nice to talk to her alone for the first time in ages – without Jake or Glen around.

When she pulled up in front of my dorm, she leaned over and gave me a hug. "Clare," she said seriously. "Please, be careful."

"Oookay, Mom," I said, not really understanding why she was being so stern. I grabbed my laundry and ran up the stairs, hoping that Eli had waited for me. I dumped the bag next to my desk, took a second to check myself in the mirror to make sure I looked presentable and summoned enough courage to knock on Eli's door.

It took a minute for him to open it and I almost thought he wasn't in there, but I could hear his footsteps. "Hey," I said warmly. "Still want to get some dinner?"

His expression hardened in a way I couldn't read. "What's the matter? Your boyfriend is busy tonight?"

"What?" I asked, completely thrown off by his question.

"I don't get it, Clare," he said sharply, folding his arms over his chest. "We've been friends again for _weeks_ and you neglect to mention the fact that not only do you have a boyfriend, but it's Jake Martin. And obviously it's pretty serious if you're bringing him home for family dinner with Grandma."

I gaped at Eli, unable to believe what he was saying. "Eli, it's not what you think."

"Give me a fucking break, Clare. I'm not an idiot."

His expression was so serious that I couldn't help but crack up – which judging by his look of rage, didn't really help matters at all. "You're right," I said finally. "Jake picked me up for family dinner. Which he is always invited to, because he's my stepbrother."

Eli looked at me like he couldn't believe what I was saying. Unfortunately a few of the girls who lived down the hall were also watching our conversation with amusement. "Could we take this conversation somewhere a little more private?" I asked, and Eli held his door open so I could pass him. I sat in his computer chair this time, though I turned it fully around so I could face him as he sat on the bed, looking humbled.

"I thought I told you about our parents right after Jake and I broke up," I said softly, trying to break the ice.

"Maybe you did," he said, running his hand through his hair. "But you never said anything more about it, so I guess I figured they must have broken up at some point."

"I talked my mom into postponing the wedding for a year, so that we'd know for sure she wasn't rushing into anything. By the time it actually happened, you and I weren't really speaking anymore."

He shrugged, looking down at his hands in order to avoid my eyes. It occurred to me that Eli's response to the possibility of me dating Jake kind of went beyond minor annoyance at a friend leaving out a detail about their life. Did that mean that his feelings for me might be a little more than friendship? The thought of it made my heart race, but I couldn't just ask him if he liked me. If there was something up here, though, I needed to figure it out.

"Why would that bother you?" I asked tentatively. "If I were dating Jake?"

He shrugged. "Everybody hates the person their ex dates after them." I realized this was the first time since we'd rekindled our friendship that we'd directly addressed the fact that we had dated.

"Even after all this time?"

He laughed. "Yeah, apparently that just doesn't go away."

"You shouldn't hate Jake," I said, feeling a need to defend him. "Even when we were dating, it wasn't that big of a deal. Just a rebound really." He didn't look convinced. "And we've been siblings for over a year; trust me, I don't even consider him an ex anymore, just a brother."

"That does help," Eli admitted with a chuckle.

I still was a little confused about where we were going with this, but I figured Eli had let me in a little, and I could do the same for him. "I do understand how you feel though. I mean, I'm not exactly Imogen's biggest fan either."

"You know, she wasn't technically my girlfriend, so I'm pretty sure you shouldn't hate her either."

"You brought her to prom," I reminded him. "And it wasn't just a friend date."

He laughed. "Okay, fine. We were more than friends. But it wasn't really a relationship."

"I don't get it." Eli and Imogen had always been a mystery to me.

"I mean, I liked her…and I know she liked me. And we had a good time together. But we just kept it as friends because it was easier to keep thing simple between us. And then when we went off to university, we were able to just stay friends. No awkwardness or anything."

"So you're friends with benefits?" I asked, a bit nauseous as I waited for his response.

"We're friends," he said in amusement. "There haven't been any benefits in a very long time, and I have no desire to change that."

I wrinkled my nose at the thought of them fooling around which caused Eli to laugh in a way that really bugged me. "I just don't understand how things could be simple for you two. I mean, she was so obsessed with you that she was practically stalking you. I can't imagine she was happy with a prom date and nothing more from you."

"As I'm sure you remember, the reality of dating me is much less exciting than you'd imagine. Once she realized I wasn't exactly the wild and crazy guy she'd hoped for, she was fine with being kind of casual and temporary."

"It still doesn't sound very simple to me."

He looked frustrated, as if he wanted to be talking about anything else in the world. "Look, I liked her, but I knew I wasn't going to fall in love with her. So it didn't matter if we went out to the movies, or went to prom, or made out, because I knew it wasn't going to be anything more. And so did she."

Ugh, another image of them kissing formed in my brain. "You're not really selling me on the not hating Imogen."

He laughed. "Yeah I don't know. I would have thought time would take care of it."

I grinned, "You know what the solution is. You have to convince one of your parents to marry your ex's parent. Then you have so many other things to be awkward about that you totally don't care who they date next."

Eli smiled. "Does that really work? Cece and Bullfrog seem pretty happy, but awkward ex situations really aren't fun."

"It worked for me. Jake really liked Liam even though he was the next boyfriend."

Eli gave me a sideways look. "You dated Liam?" I nodded. "Liam, the annoying kid who only talks about music?"

"He's not annoying," I said, feeling obliged to defend him as well as Jake.

"Oh yes he is," Eli said, excitedly. "Once Adam told him Bullfrog was in the Sweet Ophelias, he spent my entire Grade 12 year following me around school, begging me for copies of demos. I was like, 'Dude, the band broke up before you were born,' but he didn't know how to take a hint."

"He calmed down a lot since then."

Eli's face fell. "Are you still dating him?"

Aha. Yet another sign that he might be interested. "No. We broke up before we went away to university. It was mutual."

"So it was recent."

I gave him a look of confusion. "Yeah, but…it wasn't a big deal."

He didn't respond. I felt really awkward, but I had one more thing I needed to know. "Are you dating anyone now?"

He looked up at me. "No."

I could tell he didn't want to expand upon that statement even though there was something else bothering him. But tonight was too confusing for me to even begin to understand what was happening. "So…do you still want dinner?"

Eli sighed. "I'm not really hungry and I'm kind of feeling like an idiot right now. Can I take a raincheck?"

"Sure," I said, standing up. He didn't move and all I wanted was too be out of that room. "See you later."

When I got back to my room I closed the door behind me, glad to see Mikayla was out. I hit the power button on my laptop and while I waited for it to start up, I tried to figure out what had just happened. After eating all day with my family, I wasn't super hungry but I popped a container of Cup O Noodles into the microwave to give myself something to do.

Eli wouldn't have been that upset that I was dating Jake if he didn't have feelings for me now, right? The thought of him dating another girl made me ill. But other than tonight's conversation, he'd never given me any indication that he wanted to date me again.

I was probably taking this the wrong way. He was right; you always hate the person who comes after you. The Jake and Liam thing was just an aberration, made more complicated by the fact that we were stepsiblings and forced to block out any past romantic feelings we may have had.

I logged into Facerange, in the mood to procrastinate from my homework and my jaw dropped as I saw the first status update.

_Liam Stentiford is now in a relationship with Samantha Scott_.

Well, that explained why he kept calling me. It was nice of him to at least attempt to let me know before publicly announcing to the world that he had moved on. I clicked on her name to see how high her privacy setting were on, but the only thing that was publicly available was her profile picture – which featured her and Liam. They had their arms around each other and they were smiling.

She lived in Texas and she was pretty and all I could think was that I hoped she made Liam happy. I certainly didn't feel any hatred toward the girl.

It was clear that I was completely over Liam.

It was beginning to be clear that Eli wasn't completely over me.


	6. Rock Show

**DISCLAIMER: I don't own Degrassi or anything else.**

**Twitter: themusiksnob / Tumblr: musiksnob**

**Again, so much thanks for all of your sweet reviews. I've heard from a lot of new people, which is even more amazing. I'm not sure if you've just found me or if there's just so few fanfiction writers left that you're trying to show support more actively, but it's very much appreciated. (And if you haven't read my old stories, I'd recommend them.)  
><strong>

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><p>Chapter 6<p>

I was happy that Eli had shown up at my door the first next night after our awkward conversation about exes to invite me to dinner with him. We spent the next hour in the cafeteria, arguing about whether his tacos or my stir fry was grosser, discussing The Handmaid's Tale which we had just read for our seminar (even though we'd both read it in high school), and very purposefully avoiding any other topics relating to our past relationship or the people we'd dated afterward. We were definitely feeling more comfortable around each other and I was glad that we hadn't crossed into territory too weird to come back from.

But it had been a few days since I had seen him, except for in class, and it was Friday night. I was resolved to do something – anything really, as long as it didn't involve the library or sitting in my dorm room, resenting Mikayla. But I didn't really have anyone else to do things with, so I hoped Eli would have some ideas.

I had put on my favorite pair of jeans – even though I noted they were a little bit tighter than usual – and a blue button down shirt that I'd left open with a white tank top underneath. I checked myself up and down in the mirror and noticed that the one small benefit of gaining part of the freshman fifteen was that my boobs were looking fantastic. I briefly considered buttoning the top, but I decided to throw caution to the wind. It was Friday night; I didn't have to keep myself all covered up like I was going to church.

I double checked that I had my keys, wallet and phone and checked my hair one last time in the mirror. I locked my door behind me and knocked on Eli's.

It often took him a minute to answer the door – I suspected he often took his pants off the second he was alone – so I waited, as patiently as I could before knocking again, a little harder.

It occurred to me that I was an idiot – basing my entire night around a guy I hadn't really seen in a week. I didn't even know what I wanted to do, only that I wanted to hang out with Eli. But Eli had his own friends; he was barely around and even when he was with me, he was always texting Fiona. He had come to the University of Toronto and made a life for himself, while I sat around, doing nothing, waiting for life to happen to me.

I was about a minute away from crying hysterically, as I stared at his closed door. He was probably out on a date with some girl; of course, he wouldn't spend his Friday night waiting around for me. It was only 6:30, but they could have just left for a night of dinner (off-campus, of course) and a movie.

I was feeling so helpless that I pulled out my phone, figuring I could call my mom and ask her to pick me up. I'd rather be home with my family than here and miserable.

"Is there any reason that you're lurking outside my door?" Eli asked, practically giving me a heart attack. I stepped out of his way so he could unlock the door and drop his backpack off inside.

I was so caught off guard that I said the first thing that came to mind. "You don't have a white board."

He raised his eyebrows in confusion. "I didn't realize I needed one."

My voice raised in indignation. "Well, yes, you do need one, because I knocked on your door and you weren't here. Which wouldn't be a big deal, but you don't have a white board, so I couldn't leave you a message and let you know that I was here and looking for you."

He gave me an amused grin. "Or you could just text me."

His words threw me for a loop. I had put his number back in my phone after our professor had insisted we find a "buddy" in the class and he'd given me the number I had never quite forgotten. But for some reason, I hadn't realized that we'd progressed to the level of friends that I could text him and ask him to hang out.

"Right, that makes sense," I said with a blush, feeling foolish.

"What was the message you wanted to leave me?"

I looked down at my shoes, feeling really embarrassed. "I just wanted to see if you wanted to do something tonight."

"I have plans tonight," he said, and I immediately cut him off before he could offer a consolation lunch later in the week when it was convenient for him.

"Of course you have plans," I snapped. "It's Friday night and you're in university and you have friends and you're having the time of your life. I'm the one who's stuck here, alone, with an evil roommate and no friends. And I'm so pathetic that I couldn't even come up with something for us to do together; I just hoped you'd be free so I wouldn't have to spent another night in the library, studying and doing homework for the millionth time, even though it doesn't seem to help because my grades have gone to shit, and the only other alternative is for me to go crying home to my mother and admit that I'm nothing but a failure."

The waterworks were seconds away from spilling and I turned away, too humiliated by my outburst alone to allow Eli to see me cry. But he grabbed my arm and looked me straight in the eye. "I was going to say you could join me."

Oh. God, I was such an idiot. "I'm sorry that I just freaked out on you."

"Hey, it's okay," he said gently. "You forget that this is my second university experience. I get that it's not easy."

"What happened?" I asked, but Eli shrugged.

"No point in dwelling in the past. I think you just need to have a nice night out." He grabbed a light jacket and shut his door.

"Am I dressed appropriately?" I asked, realizing I still didn't have a clue what we were doing.

"You look beautiful," Eli said, and I couldn't keep the smile off my face. He offered me his arm and we walked to the stairs together, though I had to let go as we walked down the stairs.

"So where are we going anyway?" I asked as we crossed the campus quad.

"The Rathskeller," he said, referring to the campus pub.

"I'm not 19," I reminded him.

"It's all ages, except for one or two nights a semester. You just can't drink." He smirked at me. "I could make you a fake, but it's best to use those off campus."

I had never actually been there before, partly because I hadn't realized it was all ages, and partly because I hadn't had anyone to go with. But I'd heard they had good food there. "Yeah, that's okay," I said. "I can wait until March."

"Suit yourself," he said. He led me into the pub, looking around until he found a somewhat familiar looking girl sitting at a table by herself. "Hey Mo," he said, taking the seat next to her, much to my disappointment. "This is my friend Clare. We went to high school together and she lives across the hall from me now."

I didn't have time to reflect on how weird it was to have Eli refer to me as a friend, because the girl held her hand out for me to shake. "Maureen Jensen," she said briskly, though her face softened as she looked at me. "You're in my philosophy class, right?"

"Yeah, I am," I said, realizing why she had looked familiar.

"That class is ridiculous," she said. "Just a midterm and a final. We're almost halfway through the semester and I have no idea if I'm going to fail or get an A."

"Yeah, it's a little nervewracking. I've starting making a study guide from my notes and the chapters, but I have no idea what he's even going to include."

"That sounds awesome," she said. "If you want to get together and study, I'm totally up for it."

"AKA she wants to steal your study guide," Eli teased, bumping into Maureen's shoulder.

"That sounds good," I said, trying to keep my voice even. Was Eli interesting in her? They were going out on a Friday night, and he was being a little flirty. But he wouldn't have invited me along if it was a date.

"Oh, Eli, there's a voicemail for you from Dave. He said he needs to reschedule," Maureen said.

"Shit, are you serious? I've already put up the flyers."

"He left his cell phone number. You should call him tomorrow."

I watched the two of them talk in an unfamiliar shorthand. They seemed so comfortable with each other, but I had no clue what was going on. They shared a voicemail? Eli made posters?

They chattered on for a few minutes before Maureen looked at me with regret. "I'm sorry, Clare. We're probably boring you."

"It's okay," I said, still feeling uncomfortable. I looked around and saw that the stage was mostly empty except for some speakers and mic stands. "Don't they usually have music here on Friday nights?" Since I usually spent most of my meals alone, I'd read lots and lots of table tents advertising events for students though I hadn't bothered to check any of them out.

Eli laughed and Maureen grimaced. "Yeah, except for when the band is running an hour late. Not that it matters, because our stupid sound tech isn't here."

Eli laughed harder and Maureen pushed him. "Not funny, dude. Just wait until next week when you have no band at all."

He shrugged. "Student soloist night. I'll call Garrett and Chris. They're always up for a show."

I wrinkled my eyebrows at him and he opened his mouth to explain when a tall guy in a Radiohead t-shirt came up to our table. "They're still not here?"

"You're lucky they aren't," Maureen said crossly. "I didn't tell you that you could be an hour late."

"You know I can't do anything until the band gets here."

They continued to argue and Eli slipped out from between them, taking the seat next to me. "This is Jerry," he said. "Maureen's boyfriend and our resident sound tech."

Sure enough, they had stopped arguing and Jerry had leaned down to give her a kiss, placating her entirely. Eli introduced us and Jerry took the seat Eli had vacated. A waitress came up and Eli ordered a beer, but neither Maureen and Jerry did. "Can't drink on the job," she explained.

Eli leaned closer to me. "Want to split some fries?"

"Sure," I said, feeling more comfortable again.

Jerry looked over at the door. "The band's here." He jumped up to meet him, and Maureen followed.

"Clare, are you staying for the show?"

I looked at Eli and he nodded. "Yeah."

"Cool, find me after and we'll set up something for the philosophy test. It was nice meeting you." She ran off after Jerry; I could hear her giving the band members a piece of her mind from across the crowded pub.

I turned to Eli, trying to piece together everything I had heard tonight. "So what is all this?"

He grinned. "What do you mean?"

"This is what you do…why you're always busy? You put on concerts in the campus pub?"

"Shows," he corrected. "Concerts make it seem like it's either Vivaldi or in an arena."

"How did you get into this?" He'd been on campus the same amount of time as me, but obviously his time had been spent way more productively than mine.

"Well, I wanted to get on the campus radio station, but I went to a meeting and they basically require you to take a class on Broadcast Radio before they'll let you on the air. And I talked to the station manager and explained that I'd interned at Solid Rock 98 and who my dad was, and he was kind of a dick about it. And Jerry pulled me aside and told me that first years didn't get their own shows, and even if I stuck it out, I'd end up with a 4-6 a.m. show and I'd have to get all my playlists approved and it didn't sound worth it."

"That sounds awful."

"But he introduced me to Maureen and she told me there was a spot open for the Campus Activity Board to bring music into the Rathskeller, and it sounded pretty cool, so I went for it, and got it. So now I'm charge of shows every other Friday and one Tuesday a month and I get to bring in local acts. It's pretty sweet."

His face just lit up while he talked about his role and I felt so happy for him. "I'm glad. It sounds like you're really enjoying it."

"Definitely. It's a lot of meetings and stuff, since they do most of the programming on the campus, and I have to go to a bunch of dumb programs and act like an usher or whatever, but the music has been great. I end up coming half the time when I'm not in charge just so I can hear them." He poked me in the arm. "So that's why I'm never around…since you seem to be stalking me."

"I'm not," I said, shoving him with my shoulder. "I just live across the hall and spend a lot of time in my room."

"Well, we're going to have to work on that," he said, taking a sip of his beer. "Finding you your thing."

"It's just hopeless. I can't find anything."

"Clare…come on. Have you even tried?"

"Yes, _Mom_," I joked.

"Seriously," he said, leaning closer to me. "It's not good to only have one person in your life. You need more than that." He looked sad. "I tried that in Vancouver and it didn't turn out well."

Eli hadn't explained what exactly had happened to him out there and I was curious, but his statement was off-putting for another reason. "So you think my whole life is wrapped up in you? Conceited much?"

"Clare," he said seriously. "That's not what I'm saying at all. I just think you need some more friends in your life. You had lots of friends in high school – and stuff to do. Yearbook or Friendship Club or Newspaper or Drama Club. Something besides schoolwork."

I was glad Eli had his life all figured out, but it wasn't like I hadn't tried those things. "Well, I went to the U of T equivalent of Friendship Club and at their first meeting, they wanted to do a protest at the GLBT Club's event for National Coming Out Day. So clearly no matter how much I love Jesus, I'm not going to get along with those kids. And I tried to get on the newspaper staff, but like the radio station for you, it didn't work out. I asked if there were any positions open, and the bitchy news editor told me that journalism majors got all the jobs and even the beat reporters were in their second year of study."

Eli gazed at me sympathetically as I continued, trying not to cry for the second time today. "It's just at Degrassi, everything was so easy. Everyone knew I was Clare Edwards and that I could do anything. The play or Student Council or Friendship Cub or the newspaper…there was always a place for me. I just don't know where my place is here."

"You'll find it, Clare. I promise. Think outside the box. This girl in my Biology Class is in a Christian A Capella group. It's a big campus. There's something for everyone here."

I didn't want to dwell on this anymore. "So what band is playing tonight?"

"They're this little known Toronto band. You definitely haven't heard of them. But their demo was awesome and the kids don't usually come to see the band anyway, so as long as it sounds good once they're here it's a good show."

"Interesting," I said.

"I'm not really sure you'll like them to be honest…but next month I booked a Maggie Eckford show and I know you'd love her. You definitely have to come to that one."

"Sure." I couldn't help but be pleased when Eli invited me anywhere.

He grabbed my shoulder and I took at him in mild shock. "Hey, did you talk to Adam today?"

"No," I said in confusion. It figured that Adam was keeping in contact with Eli but hadn't returned my call in a week.

"He wanted to invite us to Ottawa for next weekend. I talked to Cece and she said I could borrow her car, so we're all set if you want to go. Adam figured you'd probably want to see Alli as well so the road trip would be worth it."

Hmmm, a weekend away with Eli to see my two best friends that I missed like crazy...I didn't even have to think about it. "That would be amazing," I said.

Eli grinned. "Great. I'll call him tomorrow and work out the details."

"And I'll call Alli and let her know."

We sat and watched the band soundcheck and ate our fries together. I was thinking about our trip and the five hour drive that Eli would be taking alone together. It was kind of nerve wracking but also awesome at the same time. I realized I'd need to get a lot of work done on my next paper for First Year Seminar tomorrow to be able to give up a whole weekend of work, but it would be worth it.

A thought occurred to me and I turned to Eli to find his eyes already on me. They were glued to my more noticeable than usual cleavage. He looked away, embarrassed to be caught.

"Sorry," he croaked. "I just realized you still wear the same cross necklace."

Uh huh. And that it was hanging a little closer to my slightly larger boobs that he was just ogling. "I've had it since I was a kid," I reminded him, hoping my cheeks weren't too red.

"It's nice," he coughed, gesturing for the waitress to come over to bring him another beer.

Only Eli would tell me my cross necklace was nice in order to deflect attention from the fact that he was staring at my breasts. I decided to be kind and change the subject.

"Just one thing. If Mikayla asks, we're visiting friends who go to university in Sudbury. Because if she found out we were going to Ottawa, we'd be stuck with her for the entire five hour car ride."

"The horror. The horror," he joked.

The band started to play and Maureen sat back down with us, turning her chair around to watch the band. Eli was right; they really weren't my taste, but they had a lot of energy and the other drunken university students seemed to appreciate them.

I glanced at Eli and we exchanged a smile.

And then, very casually, very unexpectedly, he put his arm around me.

He didn't move it for the whole rest of the show.


	7. Life is a Highway

**DISCLAIMER: I don't own Degrassi or anything else.**

**Twitter: themusiksnob / Tumblr: musiksnob**

**Sorry this took so long. It didn't turn out quite as well as I had hoped though I like parts of it. Thanks again for all of your sweet reviews and messages. **

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><p>Chapter 7<p>

"It's exit 118," I said for the second time, reading the directions I'd printed off Google maps even though Eli insisted we should just use Cece's GPS.

"I heard you the first time," Eli said.

"Then maybe you should get in the right lane."

"I've got two miles," he grumbled.

"Not anymore," I said.

"I can't just get over. There's someone in that lane."

"Well there wasn't when I first told you to get over."

Eli gunned the engine and passed the car, exiting the highway with a lot less room to spare than I would have liked. "Happy?" he asked sarcastically.

"Not really," I said.

The road trip had started out fun enough. Eli had programmed his Ipod with a lot of songs that we both liked and we sang along happily at first. But my refusal to skip my early afternoon Biology lab – I thought skipping my last Philosophy Class before the midterm was enough of a contribution to us leaving on time – meant that we sat in rush hour traffic for a good portion of the trip. So our five hour drive was pushing a 7 hour drive and we were both tired and a little grumpy. Alli had already called twice wondering where we were and when we gave her a revised ETA she told us to meet them at the restaurant because she was starving and couldn't wait.

But the mood lightened a bit when Eli reached over and patted my hand. "We're almost there. It'll be over soon."

"It hasn't been _so_ bad," I teased.

Eli got quiet for a second and I glanced over at him, but couldn't quite read his expression. "You know I always thought we'd get to go on a road trip someday, but it's not exactly the same without Morty."

I wasn't sure how to respond to that. I had never been the hugest fan of Morty; the large pile of stuff Eli had hoarded in back gave it a certain smell that wasn't exactly pleasant. And the hearse's association with Eli's mental breakdown and our break up wasn't exactly my fondest memory. But it was impossible to forget the good times too: so many kisses starting with the contraband kissing on our first date, driving around Toronto together seeking urban adventures, arguing with Adam over who got to control the music.

The time Eli laid me down in the recently cleaned back and whispered that he was going to make love to me someday, as I reminded myself of my purity vow so I wouldn't tell him I wished that someday was now.

"I'm not sure Morty would have made it all the way to Ottawa," I said, trying to keep my tone light. "He was always breaking down on you."

"He was sensitive...but he was strong. He would have kept it together for such a big trip," Eli said confidently.

"If you say so."

Eli had a wistful grin on his face. "Morty definitely would have made it a better road trip. Right now, we're just driving. But that would have been an experience." His voice softened. "The bench seat alone would have been a welcome change...and we could have slept in the back together."

Eli's tone was suggestive, and I felt my cheeks burning. Was he saying that he wished he could spend a night with me? Was he talking about now or wishing it could have happened back when we were together?

Suddenly the back of that old hearse didn't sound quite so bad.

"I miss Morty," I said bravely. "More than I ever would have thought."

"Yeah, me too," he said softly after a moment's pause.

I was pretty sure neither of us was talking about his old car anymore, and I wished one of us would be brave enough to say what we were thinking in words, not subtext. But every time I thought we were getting closer to taking things a step beyond friendship, one of us always chickened out.

Tonight it was Eli.

"Isn't that the restaurant?" Eli asked, pointing to the sign ahead. I squinted at the name I'd scribbled down when Alli called me but Eli had swerved into the parking lot before I could respond. I gave him a look and he laughed. "I see Adam's car."

We got out of the car and I stretched, feeling a little sore from sitting down for the better part of seven hours. "You're like an old lady," Eli teased and I slugged his arm before we walked into the restaurant together.

"We're meeting friends," Eli told the hostess as I looked around the dining room for Adam and Alli. I found them sitting in a booth toward the back and grabbed onto Eli to lead him to them.

I was surprised to see the two of them smiling at each other; Adam and Alli hadn't been each others' biggest fans when we were at Degrassi together, but I figured that they had more in common now that they were at the same university even though they probably hadn't seen each other since they were back in Toronto.

And then they leaned in and kissed each other.

Eli placed his hand on my shoulder to steady me as I watched my two best friends exchange what was definitely not a first kiss. Then he all but dragged me to the table and interrupted them with a very amused, "Hey guys."

They broke apart guiltily. "Hey!" Adam said, jumping up to give Eli a hug. "You're finally here." He hugged me next and I looked over his shoulder and gave Alli a shocked look.

She threw her arms around me and whispered in my ear. "Oh my God, Clare, I have so much to tell you."

"Clearly," I muttered.

When we had all sat down, Eli broke the awkwardness. "Okay, elephant in the room. What the hell is going on between you two?" he joked.

Alli and Adam exchanged an amused smile. "We wanted to tell you guys in person," Alli said.

"Not exactly like that," Adam said, and Alli rolled her eyes.

"Adam and I are dating."

The waitress brought Eli and I two glasses of water and I chugged half of mine down, party because I was thirsty from the long drive and partly because I felt so awkward I needed something to do. "_How _did this happen?" I asked, feeling bad because I knew I sounded less supportive than Eli had.

"It's a long story," Alli said.

"It always is with her," Adam interrupted.

She ignored him and continued. "I was pledging Kappa Zeta and at first everything was great. I met a ton of people and they had parties every weekend even though they aren't really supposed to during pledge season so it seemed really fun. But then they took the hazing up a notch and we pretty much had to spend all of our free time with them." I had heard most of this from her early brief emails, so I knew all the backstory was for Eli's benefit. "But most of the girls who were pledging with me weren't double bio-chem majors with two second year science classes so for them it wasn't a big deal. But I had class during the mandatory study periods and I was getting a lot of negative comments when I attempted to study during social events and I just couldn't do it all."

"I, on the other hand, had no social life whatsoever outside of GLBT club and spent all of my free time in the chemistry lab, trying to keep up with the insane amount of lab work. And low and behold, who do I run into but Alli Bhandari, who despite her complaints, was breezing through the assignments I was struggling with," Adam laughed.

"It turned out we had the same professors for Orgo and Cell Molec even though we were in different sessions. So we started helping each other out since Adam's a bio wizard and I'm much better at chem. And I aced my first chem exam but I got a C in bio and I realized if I didn't quit the sorority I wasn't going to be able to complete both majors in four years."

"Okay enough with the curriculum vitae," Eli said. "How did you go from study buddies to people who make out in public places?"

Alli smiled. "We were up late trying to get our Orgo homework done and we were alone in Adam's room, and I just kind of looked at him and realized I wanted to kiss him." I could see her reach for Adam's hand under the table. "So I did."

"My first thought was 'Fuck, a hot girl is kissing me; I must be dreaming.'" Adam laughed. "But I figured out it wasn't a dream pretty quickly."

"And we talked about it the next morning, and he admitted he'd been crushing on me a little too, so we thought we'd just take it slow and see what happened."

"The next morning?" I said, regretting my harsh words as soon as they'd come out of my mouth. I knew I sounded judgmental, but did they really spend the night together after their first kiss?

"Yes, Clare," Alli's voice sounded tense. "After I went back to my room for the night, I brought him some coffee and we talked about it since we had a study date set up for that night and I didn't want things to be awkward."

"Well, I think this is great," Eli said. I wondered if he was just putting on a show for them or if he really thought them dating was a good idea. He hadn't liked Alli very much when we were dating despite the fact that the two of them had barely been around each other. "How long has this been going on?"

"About a month," Adam said. "We wanted to be sure before we told you."

"Clare," Alli said directly. "What are you thinking?"

All eyes were on me and I felt put on the spot. "I'm just surprised," I said. "But it's great. I just want both of you to be happy, so if you're happy together, all the better."

Alli grinned at me and as much as I wanted to see Adam, I wished she and I were alone right now so we could catch up on everything we'd missed out on for almost half a semester. Hopefully sometime this weekend we would be able to break away from the boys and have a good old fashioned girl talk.

Eli cleared his throat. "I brought you guys a little present. It was supposed to be a 'thank you for having us' kind of thing, but I guess it's more fitting as a 'congrats on your new relationship' present." He pulled out his wallet and for a second I thought he was going to pull out a condom which was weird on about five different levels but instead he pulled out two fake IDs. "They have your real birthdays just a year older than the real ones."

"Thanks Eli!" Alli said, grabbing hers out of his hand. "Wow, these look really good."

"Eli is the master," Adam joked. "Thanks man."

"See Clare...some people are appreciative of my talents." Eli bumped my shoulder. "Clare won't let me make her a fake. She wants to wait until her actual birthday to go out and get shitfaced."

"Well I don't," Adam said, waving at the waitress.

"You have your car," Alli reminded him. "But I can get something." She grabbed the fancy liquor menu.

Adam looked so disappointed that I figured I could be nice. "If you want to get a drink, I'll drive your car home."

"Awesome," he said.

Adam ordered a beer and Alli ordered the girliest drink on the menu. Eli and I put in a food order, trying to catch up to them since they'd practically finished their meal while they waited for us.

We spent the night laughing, reminiscing and sharing university stories. Eli told them about his job booking bands, and Adam and Alli told us about a lab they had to do four times because they kept screwing it up. I wished I had some happy stories to tell them, but I caught them up on the nightmare of having Mikayla as a roommate. Adam and Alli were both pretty buzzed by the end of the night and all four of us were having a great time.

We were the last customers at the restaurant and finally the waitress asked us to leave so she could close up. Adam handed me his car keys. "I'm going with Clare," he said, his voice slurring slightly. "I don't want her to crash my car."

Eli looked skeptical. "Okay. Alli, you want to ride with me so you can get us back to campus?"

She pouted for a second before agreeing. "Fine. Clare, make sure you follow us; I'm not sure if Adam's sober enough to navigate."

"I'm fine," he protested, but I made sure to follow them back onto the road.

"So you and Alli, eh?" I still could barely wrap my head around it, but I had to admit the two of them were sweet together. Adam was always a guy who wanted to make the people around him happy, but Alli seemed like she'd matured a little bit since going to university.

"She's pretty awesome," Adam said. "I kind of wished I'd paid more attention to her at Degrassi."

Something told me that might not have worked out as well for him. Alli was too busy crushing on heartthrobs to notice an amazing guy like Adam back then. Although she had dated Dave, who – in addition to being really cute – was more down to earth and intelligent than most of the other guys she'd been interested in.

"Did you tell Drew?"

Adam laughed. "Yeah. He's really happy for me. He and Alli didn't really date that long anyway, and he's back in Toronto still stringing along Bianca and Katie. It's not weird at all."

Adam was starting out the window but he turned to me so quickly I thought there was something wrong. "Are you and Eli together again?"

"No," I said glumly. "Why? Did he say something?"

Adam smirked. "Four hours and I'm already the go between."

"Come on, Adam."

"No, he didn't say anything specific. It's just...the way you guys act around each other. You're always flirting even when you don't think you are. Reminds me of Grade 10."

I sighed. It felt like flirting to me too. I didn't understand why Eli could be so comfortable around me and want to be with me and not want to take that next step. Then again, there were a lot of things I didn't understand about Eli.

"Can I ask you a question?" Adam grimaced but nodded, so I continued. "Last year, when Eli dropped out of UBC and moved back to Toronto...why didn't you tell me?"

Adam's face tightened. "He asked me not to."

"But why would he ask you that?"

Adam took a minute before responding, clearly trying to keep himself from betraying Eli's confidence. "He was embarrassed. He didn't want you to think he was a failure."

"What? Why would he think I'd think that? Because he didn't like Vancouver? I don't get it."

"Think about where Eli was when you two broke up. And then think about where he was when he graduated from Degrassi."

"Making out with Imogen," I said bitterly.

"I'm serious," Adam said.

I thought out loud to make sure Adam could tell me whether or not I was thinking the right things. "When we broke up, Eli had a mental breakdown, crashed his hearse, found out he was bipolar...stopped taking his meds."

"He was a mess," Adam confirmed.

I was starting to see where he was going with this. "But by graduation, he was doing really well. He had friends and he was accepted to two great universities and he had Imogen..." And he'd seemed so pleased with himself that he had done it all on his own – without me.

"So when things didn't work out at university, he didn't want you to know. He wanted you to think of him as the happy, well-adjusted guy who left Degrassi." Adam patted my shoulder. "I told him he was crazy and that he should just talk to you. I didn't like lying to you but he gave me no choice."

"Do you know what happened to him out there? He won't tell me anything except that it didn't work out."

"Yeah...but that's something he'd need to tell you. I've already said too much." He grinned. "If he finds out, I'll pretend I was really drunk."

Adam showed me the lot where resident students parked and gave me a brief tour as we walked back to his dorm. When we reached Adam's room, Eli and Alli were already standing outside of the door. He had both of our backpacks slung over his shoulder and a sleeping bag in each hand. I took my stuff from him as Adam opened up the door.

His room was tiny, probably even smaller than Eli's, and it was shaped like an L. His bed was hidden and I peeked around the bend to realize that the head of his bed was literally in his closet. "Why is your room set up this way?" I asked, wondering how Adam slept with his shirts hanging over his head.

"If you put the bed where it's supposed to go, there is absolutely no room. You can't even move your chair all the way back from your desk." He put his arm around Alli's waist and cleared his throat awkwardly. "So we figured you two could crash here, and Alli and I could take her room since her roommate is home for the weekend."

For some reason, I hadn't really considered the sleeping arrangements, figuring it was just like a sleepover and we'd all sleep in the same room even if it meant sleeping on the floor. This scenario meant that Eli and I would be alone together…in this tiny room…possibly sharing a very small bed. The thought of it terrified me, but at the same time, I knew spending the night with him would tell me whether or not he saw me as just a friend or something more.

Eli was standing really close me to as he had come to look at Adam's unusual bed setup and I couldn't even look at him. Especially when his response wasn't exactly what I was hoping to hear.

"I hate to break up you lovebirds, but I'm sure Clare and Alli have at least a night's worth of catching up to do. Adam and I can share his room; I'll sleep on the floor. It's no big deal."

I tried to control my tone and facial expressions so I didn't let on just how disappointed I was. "Yeah that probably makes the most sense, if it's alright with you."

I stepped out of the room as Alli and Adam gave each other a goodnight kiss. I didn't bother to say anything to Eli. She joined me after a few minutes and led me up two flights of stairs and down the hall to her room.

"What's wrong, Clare?" Alli asked the second we'd settled down on her bed.

"What do you mean?"

"We've been having such a nice time tonight and the second Eli suggested that you crash with me you've been upset."

"It's not that I don't want to talk to you. It's just...I got my hopes up that if he and I were alone in a room overnight that maybe something would happen between us."

I had sent Alli enough emails about the Eli situation that she knew how confused I was over where I stood with him. "I'm pretty sure that's why he didn't want to share a room with you. He knew that if you guys were in bed together, he wouldn't be able to keep himself from jumping your bones."

"I don't think so."

Alli pushed my shoulder. "Claaa-aare. You are seriously blind when it comes to this boy. He spent the whole night flirting with you. Of course he wants you."

"Then why doesn't he just do something about it?"

She hesitated and I wondered for a moment if Adam had told her things about Eli's feelings on the situation that I didn't know. "I'm not sure. But you know, you could always do something about it."

I sighed. "I'm just afraid after everything we went through that I'm misreading his feelings. And if he only wants to be friends with me, I don't want to screw that up. He's practically my only friend at university."

"I really don't think you could screw it up. I mean, after everything you've been through you've still managed to become friends with him again. It might be awkward at first, but you worked through that the first time too. You should talk to him."

I flopped back on her bed in frustration. "I just want to kiss him."

She laughed. "Yeah, like you're going to be able to stop at kissing."

I cringed and covered my face and she cracked up. "You are totally going to sleep with him."

"No, I'm not," I protested, but she immediately dismissed my words with a wave of her hand.

"You're such a liar. You wish you were downstairs with him right now letting him bang your brains out."

"Alli!" She just kept laughing at me, and I wasn't in a position to deny that part of me did wish I was with him – even though I knew I wouldn't sleep with him right away, if ever. But I knew I could turn the tables on her.

"What about you and Adam?" I asked teasingly.

"What about us?"

"Have you two been...intimate?" I asked, fumbling for a word that was appropriate for their situation.

Alli's cheeks filled with a very uncustomary blush. "Yeah," she said softly but you could tell she was really happy about it.

"And how is that going?"

"Really good," she said. "I mean, it's obviously...different than it was with other guys I've dated, but it's been really nice."

I usually tried to change the subject when Alli brought up her sex life, though after dating Liam, I at least understood a little more of what she went through. But I'd always been a little bit curious as to how Adam dealt with that side of himself, and I'd never had the courage to ask him myself.

"Have you done...everything?"

She shook her head. "Not quite. We were taking things slowly – like glacially slowly in my opinion. And eventually I was just like, 'Look, I know you are nervous about this, but I've got needs.' And I guess that made him more confident, because once he started doing more stuff to me, he started letting me get a little closer to him. So we're still working with some limits – like he won't let me take his clothes off yet but he'll let me touch him underneath them – but I think we're both pretty happy with where we are right now."

I was really impressed as I listened to Alli. We'd been close since Grade 9 but there were many things I'd always found frustrating about her. But it seemed like she'd done a lot of growing up since she started university and the fact that she was able to have a mature relationship with a guy like Adam really made me happy.

"Is it...weird?"

She laughed. "It is weird, but not... It's just because it's not what you're expecting. You date a guy, and you expect to do certain things, and that doesn't really work here. But I really..." She paused for a second, giving me a shy smile. "I really care about him, you know. We haven't said 'I love you' yet, but I know someday we will. So it doesn't matter to me how he looks under his clothes. I'm still really attracted to him as a person." She giggled. "And I definitely don't miss giving blow jobs."

"Alli!"

"You would understand if you'd ever done it," she teased. "Although I have no idea if I'm going to be any good at _that_ when Adam is ready to try it – and he totally deserves it because he is just brilliant at it." She poked me in the side. "When you and Eli get together, you should tell him to ask Adam for tips."

"Ugh, this is all too much information." Now I remembered why I tried to change the subject when Alli brought up sex.

"You know, it's not too late. You could knock on Adam's door downstairs, and just say, 'Eli, take me now.'"

"Yeah I'm definitely not going to do that."

"I have a robe you could borrow. Did you pack any slutty underwear?"

"No!" Alli and her one track mind. "I don't even own any slutty underwear."

"We need to fix that. Maybe Adam will let me borrow his car tomorrow and we can do some shopping."

"That won't be necessary."

Alli gasped. "Or we could bring them with us and model for them, and Eli won't be able to keep his hands off you."

"Or we could just get lunch and have some nice, innocent conversations."

"Fine," Alli said. She stood up to pull down her covers and I opened up my sleeping bag and laid it out on top of her roommate's bed. We both got under the covers and Alli reached up to turn out the light.

"Clare," she said softly, and I turned toward her even though it was too dark to see her. "Talk to Eli. You've been in love with him since you were fifteen years old and you've never been as happy as you were when you were with him."

"Soon," I promised. I only hoped I'd have the courage to fulfill it sometime in the near future.


	8. Angel

**DISCLAIMER: I don't own Degrassi or anything else.**

**Twitter: themusiksnob / Tumblr: musiksnob**

**Some chapters are easy to write and some are hard. So enjoy this one way before I intended it, and don't kill me for the wait to the next one which I know is going to be impossible to write.**

**Thanks again for your support. Thanks for caring about Eclare. Thanks for appreciating a version of Clare that feels like what Season 8, 9, and 10 Clare would have grown up into, versus whatever the hell girl currently exists on the show. My fury at the bastardizing of her character continues and I haven't even seen Nowhere to Run yet.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 8<p>

Maureen and I had stopped off at the student center for a celebratory dinner after our philosophy midterm. Thanks to my study guide and her ability to create useful mnemonic devices to remember almost everything, we were both confident that we'd aced it. We had studied together twice before the test, but this was the first time since we met that I had hung around with her socially and I discovered that I really liked her.

She was a junior and a history major but she'd taken a few English classes as electives so she gave me some advice on what professors to take and avoid. She was also a big reader and liked a lot of the same writers that I did, particularly guilty pleasures like Charlaine Harris and Jodi Picoult. I gave her a list of young adult books I thought she'd like, and though she seemed skeptical she said she'd pick up a few at the public library when she was home for Winter Break. We both lamented the fact that it was impossible to read for pleasure during the semester with all the mandatory novels and textbooks and articles. Maureen was also up for mocking Eli's taste in music which was always fun for me.

Halfway through the dinner, her friend George sat down with us and he also seemed really cool. He recognized me from the on campus church services that I attended weekly and we talked about Father Michael's sermons and how interesting they were. Maureen mentioned that she'd stopped going to the Sunday morning Protestant services a few weeks into her first year because the reverend who officiated them seemed to think he was living in the 1890s – which was exactly the experience I'd had – so I tried to convince her to give the Catholic mass a shot, since they were welcoming to me even though I wasn't Catholic. It was the first time I'd really discussed religion at any length since my Friendship Club days and it was really nice to be around people who understood my beliefs.

After dinner, I went back to my room, feeling really positive. I'd caught up on all of my work for the week and I thought I'd just sit down at my computer and check Facerange. Maybe if Eli was around I could borrow the movie for next week's seminar since he had mentioned that he owned it. I sat down at my desk and noticed the notification light was on my phone which I had left charging since the battery had died.

There were three missed calls from my mother and a voicemail. I listened to it to find her telling me to call her the second I got her message. She sounded panicked and I dialed the house line but no one picked up. I hoped she had her cell phone with her wherever she was because she was always terrible at remembering it and never heard it ring.

But she picked up right away and her voice was raw. "Clare, honey, I'm glad you called."

"What's wrong?"

She hesitated and I had a sinking feeling in my stomach. "It's Grandma. She had a heart attack this morning and...she didn't make it."

"What?" I couldn't believe what she was saying.

"I'm sorry, Clare," she said and then she burst into tears. I knew Mom and Grandma hadn't been on the best terms since the divorce though it had seemed like she had come to accept Glen, so I knew this must be extra hard on her. But Grandma and I had always been close and as much as I understood her pain, I wished she could be strong enough to be there for me.

Then again, she'd lost her _mom_ and I knew that if my mom died, I'd be inconsolable no matter the circumstances. So maybe I needed to put my feelings on hold for the moment and try to be there for her. "Do you want me to come home? I can take the bus; I'll be home in about an hour."

"No, no," she said, pausing to blow her nose. "Glen and I are already down in Niagara. Aunt Judy called us as soon as it happened but by the time we got down she was gone. We've been making arrangements for the wake and the funeral all day. There will be a viewing tomorrow night and then Friday afternoon and night and the funeral will be Saturday morning. I talked to Jake and he said he could drive you down tomorrow morning. I hope it won't be a problem to miss two days of school."

My head was swimming as I tried to wrap my mind around it. Fortunately I'd taken my Philosophy midterm, but I'd have to email my professors my assignments for my Thursday and Friday classes and get notes from someone in the class. "Yeah I think I should be fine...have you talked to Darcy?"

Mom sighed. "I talked to her a little while ago. There's no way for her to get home before Friday night at the earliest and the airfare would be astronomical. She's going to try to make it home for Christmas this year so she can spend time with the family."

Darcy had been "coming home for Christmas" every year since I was in Grade 9, but the visit home hadn't materialized, even for Mom's wedding to Glen. I tried to put it out of my mind, but honestly I felt betrayed by her, especially right now.

"Is there anything I can do?" I asked, wanting to be helpful. I also figured any sort of task would help me keep my mind off this.

"I don't think so, honey. We're doing the best we can down here, but if I think of anything I'll let you know."

I made the mistake of looking at the cork board behind my laptop and seeing the photos I'd tacked up. In addition to ones of my friends from Degrassi, there was one of my mother, Darcy, Grandma and I that was taken when I was seven years old. I choked back a sob as I said goodbye to my mother and told her I'd see her tomorrow.

I folded my arms on the edge of my desk and buried my face in my elbow as I cried hysterically. My dad's father had died when I was five and too young to truly understand how this felt, and Mom's father had died before I was born. Now Nanny Edwards was the only grandparent I had left and I'd never been as close with her as Grandma. I kept thinking of all the things we wouldn't get to do, liking baking Christmas cookies together and singing hymns in church together. She wouldn't be there for my wedding or my university graduation or the birth of my children.

After a few minutes, tears were still streaking down my face though my hysteria had passed and I started to feel restless. I paced the floor of my room, trying to calm myself down. As much as I was glad Mom had gone down to help Aunt Judy with everything, I wished she still was up here in Toronto so I didn't have to be alone.

I tried to call Alli but she didn't answer so I left her a message letting her know what happened but that I was okay. I didn't bother to call Adam since I knew Alli would tell him, plus I knew he wouldn't have much to say to comfort me beyond, "I'm sorry. That really sucks."

As much as it would be nice to talk to someone though, I knew what I really wanted was a hug. So I did the only thing I could think of and knocked on Eli's door. He didn't answer and when I thought about it for a moment, I was pretty sure that he had a Wednesday night class. But I noticed he had heeded my advice and bought a white board – though it looked brand new and never touched. I uncapped the marker with more difficulty than I would have expected and tried to decide what to write. I thought for a second and then just decided to be direct.

_Eli,_

_ I need you. _

_ It's important. _

_ Clare_

I went back to my room and tried to come up with something that could keep me occupied. I wasn't sure what time Jake was coming to get me tomorrow but I figured I might as well get as much packed as I could. I grabbed my small suitcase and started filling it with the essentials like pajamas and underwear. I had one dress with me that I figured I could wear either tomorrow or Friday for the viewing, but I didn't have many dresses in my dorm room. The church service I went to on campus was held in the common area of my dormitory and I'd learned after the first week that no one bothered to dress up for it. I texted Jake, asking him to pack two of my dresses, describing them in detail so he wouldn't pick the wrong ones. I'd have to make sure I checked them before we drove down to Niagara just in case he brought me something completely inappropriate. I realized I hadn't worn them since last spring and hoped that they would still fit.

I threw in a bunch of socks and pantyhose and a few t-shirts to wear when we weren't out at the services. I figured I'd probably want to take a shower after the drive so I packed up some of my toiletries, leaving my deodorant and toothbrush out to slip them in tomorrow.

There was a loud knocking on my door and I answered it, still kind of in a daze. I found Eli looking at me with a look of terror. "What's wrong?" he asked, and my face immediately crumbled.

"My grandma died," I whimpered and then the floodgates opened back up.

Eli pulled me into his arms immediately, stroking my back reassuringly. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry," he kept repeating. I leaned my head against his chest, my tears drenching his t-shirt. He held me with incredible patience, not letting me go even for a second, just leaning his head against mine.

After a few minutes I felt awkward, especially since we were standing in the doorway and Eli was holding my door open with his hip. I pulled back but he reached out to wipe some tears off my face. "Is there anything I can do? Do you want me to take you home? I don't have a car here, but maybe I could borrow Maureen's or something."

I shook my head. "Mom's already down at Grandma's. Could you just stay with me? I don't want to be alone."

"Of course," he said tenderly.

He watched me silently as I zipped up my luggage, leaving the bag next to my bed. "You could say something," I said finally, feeling awkward with him standing there.

"Sorry," he said. "I don't want to say the wrong thing."

"Just say anything," I said softly.

"Are you hungry?" he asked hopefully, and I couldn't help but laugh.

"I got dinner with Maureen after our class."

Eli smiled and I could tell he was happy that she and I were becoming friends. "I was going to suggest that we order a pizza or Chinese and watch a movie. Keep your mind off it a little bit."

"I'm not really hungry but a movie sounds okay. We could watch the one for class next week."

Eli smirked. "I'm not so sure that's the best movie for this occasion but sure. As long as you don't mind that I order some food. I'm starving."

"If you get Chinese, I could get an egg roll."

"Sure," he said. "I'll go order and give you a minute to finish up your packing. Just come in whenever you're ready."

He left me alone and I immediately missed him. But I went to the washroom and threw some water of my face to try to make myself look presentable. I made sure I had my cell phone in case my mom called, although I noticed that it hadn't charged as much as I would have expected it to. I'd have to make a trip to the store for a new battery after everything was over.

I knocked on his door lightly and opened it when I heard him say it was okay. I could see he'd picked up his room a little bit and made his bed. He held up the DVD we needed to watch for class "Y Tu Mamá También."

"Do you want to watch this now or wait until the food gets here?"

"Now's fine," I said. I knew that delivery takes forever on campus and I definitely wasn't in a talking mood.

Eli popped the film in his CD-Rom drive of his laptop and moved it so that we'd have a good view from his bed. He sat down fairly close to me, both of us leaning against the wall. Usually when I was in Eli's room he sat at his computer so this felt very different.

"Clare, if you're not in the mood to watch this, we can stop it at any time. Just let me know."

"It's fine, Eli. I'm looking for a distraction."

He laughed. "Oh, you'll be distracted all right."

He was right. In the very first scene of the movie, two characters were having sex. They were both completely nude and the man's naked ass was prominently displayed followed quickly by the woman's breasts. I could feel Eli laughing next to me as I watched them wide eyed, equally shocked by their dialogue which – though it was in Spanish – seemed to translate to the F word very frequently. The scene was fairly short, and I thought I'd get a break but after a brief narration, two other characters were pulling down their pants and hopping into bed together.

"Are you okay?" Eli asked with laughter in his voice.

"I can't believe this movie is homework," I admitted and he just laughed even more.

I thought maybe I'd feel differently once the sex scenes were over, but there was still tons of cursing and even though I usually liked watching foreign films I was too drained. I made it through a few more scenes but finally got up and paused the movie, closing Eli's laptop screen.

I crawled back over to him on the bed. "I'm just not up for this tonight."

"Do you want to watch something else? Or we could put on some music? Go for a walk?"

"Your food isn't here yet," I reminded him.

"Right," he said. He hesitated for a minute before asking, "Do you want to talk about it?"

I shrugged. "Are your grandparents still alive?"

He nodded. "Bullfrog's parents live in Florida and I never see them, but I see Bubbe and Pop Pop every few months."

"Oh," I said, not really sure what to say.

He lifted my chin up so I was looking into his eyes. "But if you think that means I don't understand what you're feeling right now, you're sorely mistaken."

I kicked myself as I realized I had completely forgotten about Julia. It was never easy to lose someone you loved but Eli was only fifteen when she died. And as much as it hurt that Grandma was gone, there was no denying that it was going to happen someday. "Eli, I'm such an idiot. How are you doing? I'm sure it's still really hard."

He nodded. "There are days when I think about her and I burst into tears, and days when I think about her and smile. It'll never be easy but it does get easier."

That was definitely a comforting thought but at the same time, she'd been gone over 4 years and it was still really hard for Eli. "I just keep thinking of 'What Ifs?' What if I hadn't let her eat the last piece of apple pie when I saw her last month? Maybe she wouldn't have had a heart attack. What if I had my phone with me this morning and I was able to say goodbye?"

He rested his hand lightly on my knee. "You'll drive yourself crazy like that. Trust me, I know. Instead of thinking of what could have been, just think of what was. You got to see her a month ago and you had a nice time. She was at your high school graduation and I'm sure she was so proud of you."

Eli was being so sweet to me and it just made me even more regretful. "She never got to meet you," I said wistfully. "She would have liked you."

He laughed. "I don't know about that. I don't have a very good reputation in the Edwards-Martin household."

There was no way I was admitting to him how I had told my grandmother so much about him and she was supportive of my feelings 100%. "She would have liked you," I insisted. "And you would have liked her."

He smiled. "I'm sure I would have."

There was a knock on the door and Eli got up to pay the delivery man. He ate his vegetable lo mein out of the carton with chopsticks and there was something really adorable about it. He kept offering me a bite but I decided to stick with my egg roll.

I didn't really want to talk about this anymore so I suggested we put the movie back on, since I didn't have much choice; I had to watch it for class. There weren't any sex scenes for a while, but there was tons of cursing and lots of talking about sex, which was still pretty uncomfortable to me.

One of the characters was taking a shower and I just knew in this movie that wasn't going to end innocently. I sighed and Eli bumped my shoulder. "Do you want me to cover your eyes?" he teased.

"I'm not a child," I insisted. I kept my eyes on the screen, no matter how uncomfortable it made me. And it wasn't just the sex, it was sitting so close to Eli and watching something like that. After yet another sexy scene, I glanced at my watch and realized the movie wasn't anywhere near over.

"Do you mind if I lie down?" I asked and Eli nodded. When I stretched my legs out over his bed they bumped into him and I could feel his eyes on me. The next thing I knew he had lain down behind me, propping his head up on his hand so he could see the movie over my shoulder. He draped his other arm loosely over my waist, and when I didn't protest he left it there.

If I thought it was hard to concentrate on the movie before, it was nothing compared to having Eli so close to me. It brought me back to movie nights in Bullfrog and Cece's TV room when I'd force Eli to watch romantic comedies and he'd spend the movie sucking on my pulse point to distract me. I was so tense that when Eli leaned forward and warned me that this was the last sex scene, I almost jumped out of my skin.

The movie went on for about twenty more minutes and I could barely pay attention to it. It was getting late and I was so drained that I couldn't keep my eyes open, and for a movie in Spanish, that meant that for me, the movie was basically over.

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><p>I woke up the next morning in Eli's arms.<p>

It took me a few moments to remember what that meant: that my grandmother had died and that Eli had comforted me. The picture got a little more confused as I realized that he had thrown a blanket over us and changed from jeans into pajama bottoms sometime during the night, which meant he had very deliberately wrapped his arms back around me despite the fact that I'd slept through it.

I didn't want to move; everything felt peaceful for the moment and I knew once I arrived in Niagara Falls, it would be a whirlwind of family, and grief and tears. My shirt must have ridden up in my sleep and Eli's hand was splayed out over my stomach with a gentle touch that held me against him. I noticed that his body had a very natural morning reaction pressed up against me and though I knew it was automatic and innocent, I squirmed a little to put a few centimetres between us.

My movement must have woken him up because I felt his fingers flex against my stomach, and though I anticipated he would pull back from me awkwardly, he kept his hand right where it was and lightly caressed the skin which he had barely had access to when we were together. His feather light touches felt heavenly and I struggled to control my breathing. I could feel his breath too, against my neck.

I was petrified of doing something to mess up this moment but I had to be sure. As slowly and carefully as I could, I turned so that I was on my back, looking at up him. His hand never left my body and I felt like I was melting.

"Hey," he said softly.

"Hey," I repeated.

"How are you feeling this morning?"

"Better," I whispered, gazing into his eyes.

"That's good," he said.

I moved my hand to his chest and his Adam's apple bobbed as he swallowed. "Clare, I..." he began but he was interrupted by a knock on the door.

We broke apart even though we certainly weren't doing anything wrong and I gave Eli a curious look. Who would be showing up on his doorstep at 8 in the morning?

He jumped up to answer and I stayed under the blanket, wanting to be unobtrusive. Eli peered out the door and I heard a familiar voice. "Hey Eli, I'm sorry to wake you but I'm supposed to pick up Clare and she's not answering her door. Have you heard from her at all? She's probably pretty upset because her grandmother died and I'm not sure where she might have gone."

Eli said, "Uh..." and I sat up, knowing there was no way around this. Jake saw me over Eli's shoulder and his jaw tensed.

"We're leaving," Jake said, sounding more like drill sergeant than my step brother.

I stood up and met him at the door. "Give me a minute."

I pushed the door shut, leaving Jake out in the hallway and tugged Eli a few metres away so Jake wouldn't be able to overhear as easily. "Thank you for letting me stay last night," I said softly.

"Anytime, Edwards. It was my pleasure."

"I'll probably get back sometime on Sunday. We can talk then?" I asked, knowing that after the night we spent together we couldn't put this conversation off any longer.

"Of course," he said. "And if you need me before then, don't be afraid to call. I could drive down for the funeral Saturday if you need me."

"I don't think that will be necessary but thank you so much for offering." I stood on my tiptoes to bring him into a hug and as I pulled away, I pressed a kiss into his cheek, very close to the corner of his mouth. "I'll see you Sunday," I promised and walked out of his room.

Jake was fuming in the hallway and followed me into my room. "I just need to grab my stuff," I said, throwing my toothbrush and deodorant into my bag, knowing that personal hygiene was the least of my problems. "Could you turn around so I can get changed?"

"Nothing I haven't seen before," Jake said harshly, but he at least listened and turned away.

"Don't be an asshole," I responded. Maybe it was a natural sibling relationship we'd developed because he was the only person who could piss me off enough to use words like that. I tore my shirt over my head, figuring I'd have to change the rest at Grandma's anyway.

"I can't believe you," he said angrily.

"We're not doing this here," I said, gesturing at Mikayla in the top bunk.

But his outburst was enough to wake up princess slumber. "Oh my God, Clare, did you finally get laid? You're totally doing the walk of shame." She peered over the edge of her bed and burst into laughter. "And you're banging your brother? This is just priceless. Miss Goody Two Shoes fucks her brother!"

I grabbed my suitcase and stomped out of the room with Jake following behind me. I took the stairs, not wanting to wait for an elevator with him. I knew the two hour ride would be bad enough. "Don't you want to tell her you'll be gone for a few days?" he called after me.

"She'll figure it out."

I hurled my suitcase into the back of Jake's pickup, happy to see that he'd laid my dresses flat in dry cleaner bags so they wouldn't wrinkle. He closed the cover, continuing to glare at me as I sat down in the front seat.

"I can't believe you're fucking him," Jake said, his voice cruel.

I slapped his arm even though he was driving. "What the hell?"

"I guess I shouldn't be surprised. I mean, even Dad and Helen noticed you weren't wearing your purity ring anymore. I can't believe you'd do something so stupid with Eli. You know he's bad for you, Clare. Didn't you learn anything in high school?"

"Fuck you, Jake," I said and he was so shocked he took his eyes off the road and saw the look of fury I was giving him. "First of all, I'm not _fucking_ Eli. Secondly, if I was, it would be none of your business."

"It is my business. You're my sister..."

"Exactly...I'm your sister. I'm not your girlfriend anymore."

He gave me a look of disbelief. "You think I'm jealous?"

"No!" Arguing with Jake always gave me a headache but this early in the morning under these circumstances was making me sick. "I just think you've forgotten that I'm 18 and I'm in university now, and I'm going to make my own decisions and I don't really care what you think about them."

"I bet you care what your mom would have to say about this."

I was momentarily alarmed, because yes, I didn't want my mother to find out. But not because it was Eli or because I was ashamed, but because I still didn't know what was going on between us and I sure wasn't going to let Jake ruin anything before it even happened. "Yes, because I'm sure that the second she finds out that I was upset about the death of my grandmother and had one of my oldest friends comfort me, she'll find a chastity belt and lock it up and throw away the key. Like she doesn't have bigger things on her mind."

Jake fumed. "I think you're making a mistake."

"Duly noted," I said wryly. "Keep driving. We've got a long weekend ahead of us." And I didn't say another word for the rest of the trip.


	9. Wishing Heart

**DISCLAIMER: I don't own Degrassi or anything else.**

**Twitter: themusiksnob / Tumblr: musiksnob**

**Unfortunately, I have had to temporarily disable anonymous reviews. Feel free to contact me on Twitter or Tumblr.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 9<p>

I had never been through anything more difficult than my grandmother's funeral. I had been really lucky and though I'd attended a few wakes for people who I went to church with, there hadn't been a person who'd died who'd been close to me since I was too young to really understand. So many people – distant relatives, neighbors and my grandmother's friends – came up to give me condolences which I accepted graciously, but really, I didn't want to hear it. I didn't want my grandmother to be "in a better place." I wanted her to be here, with me, baking cookies and giving me advice.

I thought that after the wake I'd get a break but people came back to the house and the doorbell didn't stop ringing. I just wanted to be by myself, to curl up in a ball and cry in private. But I was stuck sharing my mother and my aunt's childhood bedroom with Jake, and he kept retreating there, feeling awkward around all of my relatives since he'd only been a member of the family for a little over a year. He and I weren't speaking to each other, and though he'd found me crying in bed when I thought he was asleep and came over to squeeze my hand, I'd pushed him away.

The funeral itself was even harder. Mom had packed the ceremony with all of my favorite hymns and I knew I'd been spending many future church services fighting back tears whenever I heard them. I was a wreck between the music and the eulogies delivered by both the pastor who was very close to Grandma since she'd been volunteering at the church for over 20 years and my own mother, who told a few anecdotes that left the whole congregation in laughter and tears.

By the end I was so hysterical that Glen had to lead me out of the church, and at the cemetery, he offered to stay with me in the limo because I couldn't bear to go through any more. He put his arm around me and let me cry on his shoulder, while telling me stories about the house he was working on to try to distract me. My own father had sent me flowers with a letter saying that he wished he could be there but he didn't want to make things more difficult for Mom – though he'd offered a few memories of his own and I knew despite the divorce he still really cared for Grandma. But even though Dad wasn't able to be here, it was nice to have Glen. As reluctant as I initially was to accept his relationship with Mom, he'd turned out to be a very good stepfather.

After the funeral, we'd gone back to Grandma's house. Mom placed a sign on the door asking for privacy and Glen and Jake decided to head back to Toronto. Mom and Aunt Judy started out talking about practical things like needing to get the house cleaned out to put it on the market, but soon the three of us were pouring over old photo albums. Aunt Judy cracked open a bottle of wine and the three of us sat together until almost 2 a.m., getting a little tipsy as we reminisced and retold all of the favorite old family stories. We even got my mom to spill some stories of her minor teenage rebellion which made her seem a lot more human to me.

The next afternoon I dragged myself out of bed, not hungover or anything, but drained from four solid days of emotion. I was reluctant to leave but I knew I still had some work to do and the closer I got to returning to campus the more I was thinking of Eli.

My mother drove me back up to Toronto and she immediately noticed that I was uncharacteristically quiet. I tried to play it off that I was still just upset about Grandma, but I knew she wasn't buying it. Grandma had been by go-to source for advice for years but she was gone now, and I knew I needed someone to support me. Since Mom and Glen had gotten together over two and a half years ago, she'd spent so much time with him that I felt like we had grown apart from each other. But we were alone in a car for a two hour trip and I wanted to feel like I had years ago, when Mom would brush my bangs off my forehead and tell me that things were going to be okay.

So I told her the truth. That university wasn't exactly going well for me. Just how bad my roommate was. How I felt lonely and unhealthy since I knew I'd gained weight since moving on campus. It turned out her university experience had started out very similarly, but she had gotten through it. I knew a big part of that was that after her first semester, she had met Dad.

I knew that a big part of me finding happiness in the immediately future was working things out with Eli. So I caught her up on everything that had happened between us: how we'd forged a friendship despite initial awkwardness right up until Wednesday night when he had supported me in my grief. She listened without comment, and without judgment – though she raised an eyebrow when I explained just why Jake and I had been so awkward around each other for the last two days, and I was terrified to hear her response.

"You should tell him how you feel about him."

"What?" I couldn't believe my ears.

"There's no point in dancing around it any longer. You're clearly in love with him and it sounds to me like he's feeling the same way."

I gaped at her and she took her eyes off the road for a second to glance at me. "What?" she asked in confusion.

"That wasn't what I expected you to say."

She rolled her eyes. "You expected me to say that Eli is all wrong for you and you should find a nice boy from church to date?"

"Something like that."

Mom sighed. "Clare, I didn't think Eli was right for you when you were fifteen years old and I'm still convinced I was right about that at the time. But you're not fifteen anymore. And he's not still wrapped up in his dead ex-girlfriend and dealing with a myriad of mental health issues. From what you've just described, he's doing a lot better than you are at university."

"Yeah, no kidding."

She reached over and squeezed my hand. "I trust you. And if there's anything I've learned in the last few years it's that you can find love and happiness in the most unlikely of places. For me, that's Glen, and for you – I think it could be Eli."

A tear sprung to the corner of my eye. "Thanks, Mom." I had never expected that she'd be this supportive. She had begrudgingly tolerated Eli once upon a time and I knew that she was really putting her faith in me in accepting my feelings for him.

She cleared her throat. "There's one more thing we should talk about." She tapped her finger nervously against the steering wheel and I narrowed my eyes at her curiously. "Glen's been after me to have this conversation with you for years and I've just been putting it off, but now you're in university and if you are thinking about getting back together with Eli, I just think this isn't a topic we can avoid any longer."

Her rambling was making me really nervous. "Just tell me."

"We need to talk about sex."

Oh, God. "Mom!"

"Clare, I can't ignore the fact that you've stopped wearing your purity ring."

"But I haven't had sex," I whined, wishing I was anywhere but stuck in a car with my mother.

"And I'm glad to hear that, but realistically, this is something you're going to be facing in the near future. And I don't want you to make the same mistakes I did."

"Oh my God," I groaned, but she waved me off.

"You see, I met your father when I was your age and we were deeply in love but I felt very strongly about waiting for marriage. And we got married when we were just 20 years old because we didn't want to wait any longer. I don't want you to think I regret marrying him because if I hadn't, I wouldn't have my two beautiful girls." She smiled at me. "But getting married so young made things so difficult for us. I never finished my bachelor's degree and your father had to work two jobs to put himself through law school."

"What are you trying to say?"

"I'm trying to say that you shouldn't feel pressure to get married at a young age in order to have sex. If you love Eli and he loves you, you should…" She took a deep breath. "Feel free to explore that love physically."

I was so shocked that I couldn't even respond. My super religious mother was giving me permission to have sex outside of marriage? Not even just permission but _encouragement_?

"But if you do," she said, her voice turning serious. "There are certain precautions you need to take."

"I know," I said, but she kept going.

"I used an IUD for years but between Darcy and you I was on the pill and it was really very convenient."

"I can't believe we are having this conversation."

"This is very important, Clare."

"Yeah, Mom. I'm aware. I've taken health class."

Mom pursed her lips. "Okay. But I'd make an appointment with health services on campus as soon as possible. You may think you have some time, but you'd be surprised how quickly these things can spring up on you. I mean with Glen, it had only been a week before we ended up…"

"Do not finish that sentence," I said, cringing and fortunately she finally listened to me.

Mom had just pulled off the highway and stopped at a red light. She squeezed my knee and gave me a teary smile. "I'm glad we can talk like this. It just makes me sad I can't talk to my mom anymore."

"Oh Mom," I said and we both started crying hard enough that she had to pull into a parking lot. I took of my seatbelt and we hugged until we had both calmed down.

I offered to come home with her but she reminded me that I needed to get back to school and have a very important conversation.

When she dropped me off on campus, I went back to my room. I glanced at Eli's door but it was closed and I wasn't sure if he was actually there. I was feeling nervous enough that I decided to drop off my things and get my head together. Mikayla wasn't there but she had left a note on my desk telling me that she had talked to Eli and that she was sorry about my grandmother, but that if I ever left for four days again, I should let her know so she wouldn't think I was dead. The note was so uncharacteristically kind that I was almost touched, until I saw her P.S. that she had drank all of my diet coke.

I decided there wasn't any point in putting this off any longer so I knocked on Eli's door. I waited with baited breath for him to open the door as I could hear the scrape of his chair against the floor and I knew he was in there.

Eli opened the door and saw it was me and his face fell.

My heart stopped. All of the confidence I had built after spending the night with him and then my conversation with my mother flew out the window. There _was_ something between us. Why did he look so disappointed to see me?

"Hey," I practically asked rather than said.

He cleared his throat. "Hi. How are you doing? How was everything?"

Okay, at least he could have a normal conversation. "Good," I said. "Well, not good exactly, it was really hard, but I'm doing okay right now. And everything was fine, you know, the whole family came together. It was about as good as I could have hoped for."

"That's good," he said softly. "Listen, I've got a lot of work to do…" He took a step back from the door.

This was not happening. I did not spend every waking moment that I wasn't thinking about my Grandmother planning out this conversation to let him blow me off. He almost kissed me four days ago. I was not going to let him get away with pretending that it didn't happen.

"Well, that's going to have to wait," I said firmly, pushing my way into his room. I sat down on his bed and patted the area next to me. He sat down, but a little further away than the spot I had suggested. "Eli, I…" I began but he cut me off.

"Just don't," he said, his voice sounding pained.

But I couldn't stop now. "We've been dancing around this for weeks," I said. I was afraid to be more specific with the look of unhappiness he was giving me.

"Clare," he said, turning his eyes to the floor. He used a strange tone of voice and I realized we were about to have a conversation we'd had before, when I'd confronted him about the Romeo and Juliet kiss, when I'd shown up on his doorstep and asked him why he didn't like me.

"Don't do this," I said, my voice fearful. "Don't tell me this is nothing." I thought I'd used up all of my tears this weekend but my eyes filled with liquid and I forced all of my energy into keeping them from falling. If he was going to reject me, I wasn't going to let him see me cry.

He took a second before responding. "It's not nothing." But the flutter of hope I had in my heart was immediately dashed. "But that doesn't make it a good idea."

I stared at him but he wouldn't meet my eyes. There was something he wasn't telling me. "What changed?" I challenged. "Because just a few days ago, I spent the night in your arms."

"You were upset," he said, his voice raw. "I was just trying to be a good friend."

"And that's why you almost kissed me?" I asked dryly.

"Like I said...it's not a good idea."

Every time the two of us got to this point, our lives changed. The first time we had worked through it and we'd gotten together. The second time we hadn't and not only did we not get back together but I'd lost him as a friend. But I'd gone too far to give up now.

"I don't understand," I said softly.

"I'm not good for you," he said, looking directly at me for the first time. "And I'm pretty sure we're not good for each other. Look what happened last time. Do you really want to go through that again?"

"Who says we would?" I asked but he ignored my semi-rhetorical question. "I'm not fifteen anymore, Eli. You're not suffering from an uncontrolled mental illness. We've been friends again for almost two months and things have been really good. Yes, things ended badly between us but there's no reason to believe that it would happen again."

"I disagree," he said, his jaw tight with tension.

"Where is this coming from?" He shrugged. "Because as far as I can tell, on Thursday you were ready to take this step with me and now something's got you scared off. Did Adam talk you out of this? Or one of your parents?" His face turned to stone. "I'm not giving up until you give me an answer."

"Fine," he said in anger. "If you really want to know, I got another early morning visit from your darling stepbrother, who reminded me just how bad things were between you and me and warned me to stay away. But honestly, Clare, as much of a douchebag as he is, he's right. I'm not good for you."

I was filled with so much fury I had to stand a pace around the room as much as possible in a room that tiny. My hands were fists and if Jake had been anywhere near me, I wouldn't have been able to hold back.

"I'm gonna fucking kill him," I muttered, much to Eli's amusement. I was pretty sure he had never heard me say that word before. "No. This is bullshit. You're not even going to try to tell me that you're going to let my stupid stepbrother get in the way of something that could be amazing."

Eli grabbed my arm as I paced past him. I stopped for a second, thinking he would do something amazing like pull me into his lap and start kissing the life out of me. But he just gestured at the bed, and I sat down, still fuming.

His voice was soft. "We weren't right for each other. If we were, it wouldn't have ended the way it did."

I just stared at him. How could I make him see that he was making a huge mistake? "I think you're forgetting something. Jake might be my stepbrother now, but a few years ago, he was my boyfriend. And I was still upset over how our relationship ended and maybe it wasn't exactly fair, but I told him a lot of things that were wrong with it. I didn't exactly go on and on about all the amazing things we shared together because I didn't want him to think I was still hung up on you or feel jealous or whatever. So Jake doesn't have a full picture of your relationship with me. Don't let him put doubts in your head."

"He didn't say anything I hadn't already thought of myself," Eli admitted. "After everything I did to you? I was possessive and crazy and you were just trying to be honest with me and I couldn't deal with anything. I crashed my hearse because I was in such a bad place I really thought that would fix things between us. Why would you want to live through that again?"

"You're not like that anymore. You've changed. You've grown up and you're on medication."

"Yeah, but it's not like it _all_ goes away," he said dismissively. "And even if I could get past that, even if I could convince myself that I'm in a better place right now, that I could be good for you…what about you? Because all I can remember is that when I was at the darkest point in my life, you left me. You gave me some bullshit lines about change and the seasons and you broke my heart. And then you immediately moved on, like what we had was _nothing_," he practically screamed. "Do you have any idea what it was like, to see you with Jake? We were broken up for like two weeks and you were with him. Do you have any idea how bad that felt?"

"I'm sorry," I whimpered, the tears falling without any possibility of stopping them. "I was fifteen and I was scared. I didn't know how to help you and I was so terrified that you were going to hurt yourself that I couldn't stand by and watch you do it. And Jake was a mistake. Completely and 100% a mistake. I knew it back then too, but I was a mess and he was nice to me and I just didn't want to be alone."

"And that's what this would be…a mistake. You're unhappy at university and I'm nice to you and you don't want to be alone."

I gaped at him. "How can you even think that? Eli, you and I had more in a four month relationship than some couples have in a lifetime together. When I look back, I don't think about how I abandoned you or how you crashed Morty. I think about public embarrassment and contraband kissing and working on your room together and throwing secret parties with Adam and driving lessons and editing each others' English assignments."

I stood up and continued, "And now when I look at you, I just think of what could be. We're older now and wiser and maybe things are kind of tough for me right now, but that's not going to last forever. And I'd like to go through university with you by my side and see what the future holds for us. If you could just stop being so scared, I know it would be even more special than it was last time."

I gave him a second to respond, but his face was impassive. "Forget it," I mumbled, realizing just how awful life was going to be now that I'd lost him.

I walked to the door but before I could open it, his hand closed around my wrist. He turned me around gently and then his mouth was on mine. His kiss was slow burning and intense, and I fell back against the door in surprise as my hands rose to hold on to his shoulders. He gripped my waist as his tongue swept against mine and the kisses went on for what felt like forever but couldn't have been more than 20 seconds. As he pulled back, my mouth fell open in shock.

"You're right," he said softly, gazing into my eyes while his hands held my hips as if it were unable to let go. "I'm terrified. Because I'm falling in love with you even harder than I did the first time, and I can't even think about what would happen if you break my heart again."

"I won't. I'm promise." He didn't look convinced and I placed my hand directly over his heart. "I love you, Eli. I want this every bit as much as you do. And I'm not going to screw this up this time."

"Good," he said, a smirk spreading across his face. "Because I love you, too. And I'm not going to wait three more years to kiss you again."

He didn't even wait three more seconds.


	10. This Kind of Love

**DISCLAIMER: I don't own Degrassi or anything else.**

**Twitter: themusiksnob / Tumblr: musiksnob**

**Thank you again for all of your support!  
><strong>

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><p>Chapter 10<p>

Eli and I were finally together and we were both really happy. The only problem was that we were both at crunch time in most of our classes and there were papers and projects galore that needed to take precedence over our burgeoning romance. So we'd spent lots of time together in the past two weeks, but most of it had been spent surrounded by textbooks on his bed, balancing our laptops on our laps. On good days we'd take a little time out to grab some ice cream or coffee and hang out in the cafeteria for a little bit longer.

But we'd decided we'd both had enough of working, so we'd promised each other a date night. We'd even decided to go off campus for dinner, which aside from family dinners, neither of us had done since we moved in at the end of August. It was kind of funny since we'd both stayed in Toronto not only to be close to our families but because we truly loved living in this city. But it was so easy to get sucked into university life and not leave the bubble of dorms and classes.

After a dinner at a nearby Thai restaurant where we promised we wouldn't talk about school but kept debating all of the films and books we'd read for our seminar anyway, we went for a walk down the bustling street. As luck would have it, we ran into Maureen and Jerry outside the small indie film theatre and decided to join them. After a three hour foreign film, I was exhausted so we declined their invitation to go out for drinks and headed back to the dorm.

I was catching Eli up on my weekend plans as we got back to campus, holding hands the whole way. "Tomorrow's my first girls' night out with Mom," I said happily. After our talk on the way back from Grandma's funeral, Mom had sent me a huge email telling me how much she'd been missing me even though I was right across the city. We'd decided to start spending some time together, just the two of us, and I was pretty excited about it. I had told her over the phone that her advice had paid off and Eli and I were together but I wanted to give her the full story.

"Hanging out with your Mom on a Saturday night? Sounds thrilling," he teased.

"I'm looking forward to it."

"That's good," he said, squeezing my hand. "I should probably try to get home at some point. I'm definitely getting low on laundry."

I rolled my eyes. "There's a laundry room in the basement, you know."

"Yeah but laundry at home is free-er. And if Cece's in a good mood, much less labor intensive." He grinned. "And the clothes smell better."

"Well make sure you do that soon," I joked, leaning in to pretend to sniff him and wrinkling my nose. "You're kind of gross right now."

He laughed. "I promise you that every item of clothing I'm wearing tonight is clean. It must just be that I'm nervous being around such a beautiful girl."

I smiled and bumped my shoulder against his. We had just reached the dorm and I really didn't want this night to end. I could tell he was feeling the same way because he led me down to the absurdly slow elevator rather than taking the stairs that led directly to our rooms.

I stood next to my door and Eli wrapped his arms around me. "Goodnight," he whispered, leaning down to give me a soft kiss.

"Goodnight." I stood on my tiptoes to repeat the gesture.

He was gazing at me with such intensity that I couldn't help but lean in again, tangling my fingers in the ends of his hair and deepening the next kiss. His hands moved from a light hold on my waist to my back, embracing me more closely. He was leaving me breathless, a skill I remembered from when we first dated that none of the other guys I had dated after had managed quite so effortlessly. And when his lips starting moving, along my jaw and down to my neck, I noted that we were still in the hallway and two of the girls from down the hall were exchanging amused glances.

"Maybe we could take this into your room for a little while," I breathed.

"Oh, I like that idea," he groaned into my neck, and after one last kiss, he broke away, fumbling in his pockets for his keys.

I tried to catch my breath while he opened the door but it was a very brief reprieve. Eli flicked the lights on and then continued his aggressive kissing, all while swinging me around and lying me down on his bed. Without breaking the kiss, he lay down too, half next to me, half on top of me.

We'd had a few study sessions that ended up like this but we had forced them to remain brief. But tonight there was nothing else on the agenda, except for sleep, and at the moment, I wasn't feeling even the slightest bit tired.

I was starting to feel a little bit frustrated.

_That_ was definitely a familiar feeling from the first time Eli and I had dated. His kisses were electrifying; there was something about his lips and tongue and the way he used them that just sent jolts through my body, leaving my skin tingling everywhere and a wetness between my legs. But Eli had always been so polite, so afraid of offending me, that he never risked taking things any further. That was something I appreciated when I was fifteen and I thought that anything beyond kissing was a prelude to sex. But now his ever careful hands were just teasing me into a frenzy without giving me any sort of relief.

Every time he moved I thought _Okay...now he's going to do it._ He removed his hand from my waist and I braced myself for him to finally bring it up to cup my breast, my body trying to arc into his touch before it even landed. But instead, his fingers grazed my cheek, holding me to him as his tongue continued to caress mine.

I grabbed his ass, hoping a little bit of forward behaviour from me might give him the encouragement he needed to no effect. So when his lips left mine to explore my ear, paying special attention to the cartilage piercing that I had recently switched back to the original hoop, I decided to try to move things along. "You know, I'm not fifteen anymore."

He let go of my ear and gave me a confused look. "That's good because I'm pretty sure this would be illegal." His lips found my neck again and I pushed him away just enough so that he would look at me again.

"I'm just trying to say that I'm not a little girl anymore. You don't have to be afraid of offending me." He still looked confused, so I decided to lay my cards on the table as directly as I was willing to get. "I may still be a virgin but I've done _things_ with boys."

He looked amused for a second but he covered it well. "Oh yeah? What kind of _things_?" he repeated, mocking my awkward tone.

I cringed. I had thought that would be enough to start his imagination. But there was so way I was telling him that – as gross as it was in retrospect – I'd let Jake remove my shirt and bra on a few occasions, and with Liam that was a regular occurrence. And in one of those prom night induced – and perhaps slightly Mike's Hard Lemonade influenced – moments, I'd allowed Liam to put our hotel room to slightly more advanced use and given him the go ahead to do a little bit of exploring under the skirt of my prom dress. Of course our level of inexperience and nerves had made that new step a lot more awkward than sexy and once that moment had passed I hadn't given him another opportunity to try it again in the two months before our break up.

But there was so way I was telling Eli _any_ of that, particularly the part about Jake since we'd deftly avoided his name since we got back together. So I put on the sexiest face I could muster and tugged him a little closer to me by grasping the neck of his shirt. "More than kissing kinds of things."

His eyebrows raised. "Ah," he said, I supposed in understanding. "Should I be jealous?" His eyes twinkled.

I grinned. "No, you should be happy that now you get to do these things with me."

"Oh, I'm very happy." He leaned in for a brief kiss. "I can't convince you to give me any hints?"

I knew my face was bright red. Why did we have to talk everything through first? Why couldn't he just put his hands on me? "No," I mumbled, looking away so I didn't have to meet his eyes.

"How about this?" he whispered, right next to my ear. "I'll tell you what I'd like to do and you tell me if it's okay." I could only nod, unable to speak. And then in the sexiest tone imaginable, right up against my ear, he whispered. "I'd like to take some of your clothes off…and I'd like to touch you everywhere."

His fingers strayed to the collar of my shirt, tugging it down maybe a centimetre and between his words and his innocent touch on my skin, I wanted to say yes to anything he could possibly ask. Mustering all of the courage I had, I met his eyes. "Only if I can do the same to you."

His eyes fluttered shut involuntarily but when he opened them a moment later, I could see how badly he wanted me. His next kiss proved that all of his hesitance was gone, but then he pulled back a little and gave me a smirk. The hand that wasn't resting on my collarbone slowly but surely started unbuttoning my shirt, while the other trailed behind, smoothing over my untouched skin, a millimetre at a time. I whimpered as he grazed my cleavage on the way down, his lips starting the same journey at the juncture of my shoulder and neck. His slow, torturous path down my body was absolutely the most erotic thing I had ever experienced.

At the last button, he spread the fabric of my shirt and when his other hand completed its journey and his mouth was trailing down my stomach, I was shocked when he started to unbutton my jeans. It wasn't that it was an unwelcome gesture, but I wasn't quite expecting it to happen so soon. He sat up to tug them off, taking very deliberate care to make sure that my underwear stayed in place, while I shrugged off my shirt.

I expected that he'd climb back on top of me and keep things going but he stopped for a moment, sitting next to me on the bed, and gazed at my body with lust in his eyes. I definitely didn't have the self-confidence to accept his feelings at face value, but I forced myself to keep my arms at my sides, rather than cover up my breasts or my even rounder than usual stomach. I had never felt quite so exposed; even though two other boys had seen me without a bra on, neither had removed my pants before. But in some ways, Eli had given me an out. He was seeing more of my body than he ever had before but he'd left just enough clothes on that I was technically still covered. Even in his eagerness to get me naked, he'd still been sweet enough to make sure I was comfortable.

"You are…" Eli whispered, interrupting my nervous thoughts. He grazed my body down one side as he fumbled for the right word. "Incredible," he finally decided. He continued his slow, tender exploration by trailing his hand back up, this time taking my breast into his hand. "Perfect," he murmured.

I was getting the picture that Eli's default pace was slow. He wanted to spend hours kissing and caressing and while it felt incredible, I'd been waiting _years _for this. So I sat up on my knees and pulled him to me, tugging his shirt over his head while I took the lead and kissed him. He moaned in response, especially when my hands started exploring all of the skin I hadn't let myself see when we first dated. He was still really skinny but he had the tiniest hint of a developing beer belly that made me feel a lot better about the weight I'd gained this semester. And his skin was soft and smooth, except for a tiny trail of hair that started below his belly button and led to a place I definitely hadn't explored before.

Eli was responding exactly how I'd hoped and I discovered I really liked being in charge. I'd always been so tentative with guys, just following along with their kisses and their suggestions. But Eli made me feel comfortable and I could tell he liked how I was leading. So I took things I step further, pushing him back onto the bed and climbing on top of him. I paused for a second to catch my breath and Eli took the opportunity to take my face into his hands.

"Can I even tell you how many times I dreamed about this?" I raised my eyebrows in surprise and a little bit of embarrassment. "All I could think about was you on top of me, with messy hair and your fucking amazing breasts practically falling out of your bra." He reached for the exposed skin of my chest and I knew that I looked exactly like what he'd dreamed about. "God, I jerked off to that image so many times. I didn't even get to fuck you in my fantasy because just the thought of you looking so sexy would make me come."

I summoned every last bit of courage I had. "Maybe this time I could take care of that for you."

His head fell back against the pillow and he closed his eyes. "Fuck, keep talking like that and it won't even be necessary."

Eli had always been so polite when it came to fooling around that there'd always been a few lingering doubts in my mind that he wanted me. I mean, sure, he was a boy and I knew if I really asked him to sleep with me and he was sure I meant it, he would have said yes. But this whole experience was so raw and charged and he wore his lust on his face and in his moans and I knew just how was he was feeling.

The look on his face when I reached back and unhooked my bra confirmed it 100%. In fact, the look of rapture on his face was pretty much the only response I got since he was so overwhelmed he didn't even make a move. I leaned down, pressing my bare skin against his, so I could remind him of his wish. "You've taken off my clothes but you still haven't touched me everywhere," I whispered, tugging on his earlobe with my teeth.

"I'll have to change that," he said. He flipped us over and fulfilled his promise, his hands skimming over ever bit of skin from my neck to my thighs, as his mouth tantalized mine. He seemed to have caught on that I wanted to keep things moving because he started grinding his hips into mine. I spread my legs underneath him to give him a better angle and even wrapped my legs around his waist to bring us closer together. He stilled my hips and put a little bit of distance between us, giving me a soft smile. "I always knew you were sexy…but I had no idea it would be this amazing."

I tried to pull him back to me with my legs but he had other plans. His fingers slipped just under the elastic waist of my underwear, looking at me for confirmation. I couldn't form words so I just nodded and he slipped the fabric off my body. I barely had a moment to freak out that I was completely naked or to worry that my attempt to neaten things up down there in the shower this morning hadn't been enough; he threw his body back on top of mine and his fingers slipped inside me. I was glad he was kissing me because he muffled the loud moan that I couldn't stop on my own.

But as I got closer, he pulled back to watch my face as his fingers stroked my most sensitive area. There was nothing blocking out my pants and moans as Eli brought me to heights I'd never reached before – not even on my own during a few brief attempts at experimentation. His thumb circled my clit just as he leaned down to take a nipple into his mouth and I let out a loud, "Ohh, Eli," that made him grin.

"I had no idea you'd be a screamer," he teased. "You're going to give the girl down the hall a run for her money."

"Shut. Up," I muttered.

My face wracked in pleasure as he continued, his eyes never leaving mine. "I'm so close," I whispered, needing him to do whatever it took to take me over the edge for the very first time. He rubbed his fingers against me with just the right amount of pressure and I let out a scream as my body felt the ultimate pleasure. He gave me a few more soft strokes and then moved his hand away to let me cool down. The feeling was so intense and unexpected that I couldn't move. I just panted against his pillow and he watched me, at first looking very pleased with himself though I could see a few traces of confusion.

He lay down next to me and wrapped his arm around my waist. "If you want to stop, that's okay."

"No!" I protested, perhaps a little too strongly. I pushed him onto his back, trying to ignore the slightly dizzy feeling in my head. I attempted to undo his pants but his predilection for wearing skinny jeans wasn't helping anything. He reached down to unbutton and unzip them, smirking when I put on a brave face and tugged both his pants and boxers off him.

I definitely didn't have very much experience with this part of the male anatomy. I had touched Liam once or twice but that was through his pants and just a brief thing. The only time I had actually seen one in person was a complete accident. But I wanted to show Eli just how much I wanted him and give him as much pleasure as he had for me. So I knelt next to him and took him into my hand for the first time. Despite his initial moan, I had no clue how to make this good for him. I cursed myself for being so inexperienced, wishing I had been brave enough to watch porn so I at least knew what was supposed to happen.

But I did have one unfortunate frame of reference that I thought might help me. A few months after Mom married Glen, I woke up early and really had to pee. I ran to the bathroom I shared with Jake, shocked that when I opened the closed but unlocked door I found him masturbating. It took him a few seconds to realize that I was there so I got a good view of him and how much he was enjoying it before I whirled around and escaped. It took a few weeks before we were able to look each other in the eyes again.

So very deliberately, I started stroking Eli the way I had seen Jake do it to himself. But after a few strokes he grabbed my hand and pulled it off him. "Woah," he said, surprised but not in a good way. "You have to work up to that."

"I'm sorry," I said, totally humiliated.

"Try this," he said softly and patiently. He put my hand back on his penis and wrapped his around mine, helping me set a soft rhythm. I could see the difference in his expression immediately, and though I still felt awful for screwing this up, I was glad he was enjoying it. He helped me quicken the pace and then his hand fell away, leaving me to finish him off on my own. He wasn't noisy like I was, but I liked hearing his deep breaths and occasional quiet whimpers.

It wasn't long before he whispered my name and spilled over my hand. I was so embarrassed that I didn't know what to do, but he pulled a few tissues off his nightstand and handed them to me to clean myself up. I had to get up to throw them away and when I came back to his bed, I had no idea how to act. Should I snuggle up with him? Or run away and never see him again? I shifted my weight between my feet as he looked up at me in confusion. "Was that okay?" I finally asked.

He laughed, but in a kind way, not like he was making fun of me. "Your hand was touching my cock," he said. "Of course it was okay." He patted the space next to him on the bed and I lay down next to him.

I could feel the wheels turning in his brain. "Can we talk about this?" he asked after a few moments of hesitation.

I cringed. "Can we not?"

He leaned over me so he could look into my eyes. "Clare, you know…you can be honest with me. You don't have to try to impress me or pretend we're at exactly the same point."

"I'm not," I protested.

He peered at me. "You started this by telling me you had done things, but judging by your reactions, I'm not sure that you had."

"I did," I said, realizing I was sounding like an idiot. "Okay, maybe not the…" I made a hand job kind of gesture in lieu of saying the words. "But the rest of it I had done before." His eyebrows asked the question and I sighed. "Once."

He smiled softly. "See? You made it out like you became some sort of foreplay expert in the past few years. But it's okay with me that you're not, you know. You don't have to pretend."

Ugh. This was amazing how talking about this stuff was more embarrassing than actually doing it. "It's just…I wanted to do these things with you. And you never initiate them. I'm afraid you just assume I won't want to take things farther, and that means I have to be the one to initiate them and that's scary for me."

Eli looked at me with a new glimmer of understanding in his eyes. "Okay," he said. "Next time, you shouldn't be afraid to bring things up. And I won't be afraid to suggest new things, as long as you promise to stop me if you're uncomfortable or not ready."

"Deal," I said, smiling as he leaned in to give me a quick kiss.

He sat up and leaned over to the floor, grabbing his boxers and handing me my underwear and his t-shirt. I wondered if this was my cue to say goodbye for the night. But after I pulled the shirt over my head, he pulled me into a tight hug, like he was holding on for dear life.

"What's wrong?" I asked, realizing that something had shifted in tone.

He pulled back to look at me. "There's one more thing we should talk about."

The seriousness in his voice made me nervous especially when he looked away and stopped meeting my eyes. "I had a girlfriend in Vancouver."

"Oh," I said. It wasn't really a surprise that he had dated someone in the past year, but I hoped the fact that he was bringing her up now didn't mean that he still had feelings for her. The thought of that made me feel a little nauseous.

"Her name was Kate and she lived down the hall from me and we met on move in day and got together not too long afterward. We broke up in November," he said hurriedly, rushing to get through it.

"Okay," I said, not really sure if he wanted a response. So they dated for like three months? That was about how long we had dated for back in high school.

He looked down at his hands. "Anyway, the reason I'm telling you this isn't because I still have feelings for her or anything because I don't. We've been broken up almost a year and I haven't even talked to her since I moved back to Toronto, and I have no desire to change that."

"Okay," I said again, my voice almost turning it into a question as I wondered where he was going with this.

"But I think you have a right to know…" He took a deep breath. "I slept with her."

Oh. It was a testament to how innocent I was that I had no idea that was where he was going with this. I wasn't really sure how I felt about this new development. "One time?" I asked, trying to keep my voice even.

He blushed, still avoiding my eyes. "Uh, no. It was kind of a regular thing."

This was just getting better and better. "Were you…were you in love with her?"

He hesitated for only a second but then he looked up at me. "I don't know," he said, his voice sincere. "I thought I was at the time, but in retrospect…I'm not really sure."

"Why did you break up?"

"We wanted different things," he said after a moment, dodging my question in the vaguest way.

I really wasn't sure what to say to that so I kept quiet. He reached over and placed his hand on top of mine. "I'm not telling you this to make you uncomfortable. I just thought you had a right to know. And we were safe every time, and I got tested so…there's nothing for you to worry about."

That was a reassuring thought. And it wasn't like he picked up some girl at a bar and had a once night stand. She was his girlfriend and they had some sort of relationship though Eli didn't seem inclined to share any more details about that with me.

"So you've slept with Kate…and Julia…and…?"

"That's it," he said emphatically.

As unpleasant as it was to find out he had slept with another girl, at least this one lived halfway across the country and was a stranger to me. I was really relieved that Imogen hadn't made his list.

"Okay," I said, in soft acceptance.

"You don't hate me?" he asked nervously.

"Of course not," I said. "It's not like we were dating at the time. It would be unreasonable to expect that you were a monk in my absence." I wouldn't have minded if he had been but it certainly didn't change how I felt about him.

"Thank you," he said, pulling me into a hug. I leaned my head against his chest and rested his cheek on the top of my head.

Despite everything that happened tonight, the embarrassment and the less than ideal news…things just felt right between us. He stroked my face and I leaned in to give him a kiss.

Eli had been after me to tell him what I wanted all night, and I figured it was time to do as he'd asked. "Someday…in the not too distant future," I whispered. "I think I'm going to sleep with you."

He gave me the softest, most beautiful smile, with not even a hint of a smirk. "I think we should start tonight," he said, his voice husky. My eyebrows raised in shock but he immediately reassured me. "You should sleep in my bed tonight, and then someday…when you're ready…we'll work up to sleeping together the other way."

"That sounds perfect."


	11. The Way I Am

**DISCLAIMER: I don't own Degrassi or anything else.**

**Twitter: themusiksnob / Tumblr: musiksnob**

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><p>Chapter 11<p>

I knocked on Eli's door before our Tuesday morning seminar. He had a hard time waking up most mornings so I always made sure to come a few minutes early just in case he was still asleep. But I waited for a minute, knocking again, and he didn't answer.

It was rare, though not impossible, that Eli might have woken up before me and taken off for class. Some mornings he was so desperate for coffee that I'd run into him in class, where he'd have a second cup waiting for me. I'd always told him that he should just knock on my door and I'd come with him but he was terrified of waking up Mikayla and having to deal with her wrath since she seemed to have decided that her morning classes were attendance-optional.

But when I got to class he wasn't there and even when the professor came in and took attendance, Eli's seat was still empty. I wasn't really sure what was going on with him; he hadn't quite been acting himself the last few days. After my class last night, I'd grabbed dinner with Maureen and her suitemate Becca and texted Eli to see if he wanted to join us. But as I listened to Becca talk about how she was studying abroad in Paris last semester, Eli neither appeared or responded to my text.

In fact, it wasn't until I had practically reached the dorm after a long, interesting dinner that my phone buzzed and there was an email from Eli. _Hey__Clare__ – __Have__a__headache.__Going__to__bed__early.__ – __Eli._He had attached his reading response for our seminar for me to print out for him since his printer had run out of ink a few weeks ago and he was too lazy to buy more.

I couldn't believe Eli had gone to bed at 8:30 at night and that he was skipping class this morning. He at least could have answered the door to let me know he was sick. I told Professor Stinson that Eli hadn't been feeling well the night before and handed in his assignment, making sure to take careful notes on our discussion of whether the Twilight books and movies created a dangerous paradigm of sexuality and gender norms in relationships for teenage girls. I knew Eli hadn't read the books even though they were on the syllabus, but I had made him watch the first three movies with me while we were dating in high school.

By the end of class, I was really feeling worried for him. I stopped by the campus convenience store and picked up a box of tissues, carton of orange juice and a container of Nyquil. I wasn't sure if he had even bothered to get dinner the night before, so I made an extra stop at the cafeteria and begged the lunch lady to give me a to-go container of chicken noodle soup.

I walked back to his room and knocked on the door loudly enough that if he was in there, he wouldn't be able to sleep through it. I waited a few seconds and knocked again just as loudly.

Eli answered the door and I had to contain my immediate inclination to gasp at the sight of him. He looked terrible – all bags under his eyes and pale skin. His hair hung limply in his face and though I usually loved seeing him in pajama pants and a t-shirt, he looked like he had grown somewhat gaunt over the past few days even though I knew that was impossible.

"What do you want, Clare?" he asked with a weariness in his voice, as if even asking the question was too much for him.

"Oh honey," I said, pushing past him. His blankets and sheets were all twisted and I resisted the urge to straighten them up. I started to unload my bags. "Don't worry. I told Dr. Stinson you weren't feeling well and I handed in your response paper. And we talked about Twilight in class so you didn't really miss anything except an opportunity to argue with me in public." I stood back to show him what I had done. "I got you some tissues and orange juice and medicine and some chicken soup, in case you're getting hungry. If you need anything else, just let me know. Do you want me to call Cece? I know when I'm sick sometimes I just need my mom, even though it's kind of silly at my age."

"Clare," he said softly. He sounded frustrated and I turned to him in confusion. "I'm not sick."

"Oh." I wasn't sure what he meant by that. He looked awful. "What's the matter then?"

"Nothing's the matter," he mumbled.

"Eli..." I chided.

He ran his fingers through his already messy hair, looking really upset. "Look this is very thoughtful of you and all but this is really the last thing I need right now."

"And what exactly do you need right now?" I asked, dryly.

His tone turned serious with just an edge of cruel. "I need you to leave me alone."

I looked at him in shock for a few seconds, but he held my gaze, letting me know he meant exactly what he had said. I had no idea what I'd done wrong or what the hell was wrong with him, but I was pretty sure that none of this was my fault.

"Fine," I said. "You let me know when you're done being an asshole."

I managed to make it back to my room before I started crying. This all just felt so out of nowhere. Things had been so good between us ever since we got back together. I had no idea what was going on with him but it just made me feel awful that his immediate response was to push me away.

I kept running through all of the worse case scenarios: that he had cheated on me, that he had realized getting back together was a mistake. It wasn't until I imagined him planning a threesome with Imogen and Fiona that I realized that all I was doing was making myself nuts. If Eli needed a little space, I could give that to him.

I opened up the door to my room in case he changed his mind and tried to focus on getting some homework done. He hadn't left his room at all by the time I needed to leave for Biology class and I thought about skipping, but that was the class I was doing the worst in and I knew missing the lecture just in case Eli needed me was a bad call.

When I got back his door was still shut, but I could hear the tv on in the background so he was most likely there. Mikayla was in our room but she had headphones on for once and her mouth remained closed, so I continued to slog through some reading, glancing over at Eli's door every now and then.

Eventually she left for her night class, and I was starting to get almost as hungry as I was frustrated. I called in an order at a local Chinese food place and walked over to pick it up, not wanting to rely on their very slow delivery service. I needed some comfort food and if my gut was telling me right, so did Eli.

I knocked on his door again, making it clear I wasn't going anywhere. When he opened the door he looked a little better than he had earlier. He had clearly timed taking a shower with my biology class so he wouldn't have to see me and put on fresh pajamas if not real clothing.

"Hi," he said and I considered that to be progress.

"I come bearing Chinese food," I said, holding up the bag. "Peace offering?"

He looked reluctant. "I told you I want to be alone." But his tone wasn't as emphatic as it was earlier and I knew I could get through to him.

I glanced over his shoulder at his alarm clock. "Well, I left you alone for eight hours...so I'm pretty sure that I honored my end of the bargain. Plus I brought Chinese food."

He laughed despite himself. "Okay," he reluctantly agreed.

We sat down at opposite ends of the bed and started to eat, not really saying anything. Eli got up and poured us two glasses of the orange juice I had brought him earlier. It kind of tasted gross with the food we were eating but I had a feeling that was the only non-alcoholic beverage he had in the room and he probably wasn't in the mood to drink.

I was surprised when it was Eli who broke the silence. "Thanks for this," he said genuinely, gesturing at our dinner. "And the soup, before. You were right. I was pretty hungry."

"You're welcome," I said. I waited to see if had anything else to add. But he lapsed back into the unusually uncomfortable silence.

He finished quickly – I didn't think he'd eaten very much – and threw out his carton, taking his seat again and watching me as I finished up. He wrapped his arms around his knees and I could see that the hand that wasn't tucked underneath was shaking a little. I put my food down on his desk and moved just a little bit closer to him, still making sure to keep a respectful distance.

"Eli," I said softly. "Talk to me."

He shook his head.

"Why are you pushing me away?" I asked gently, trying to keep the hurt out of my voice.

I was surprised when he responded. "I don't want you to see me like this."

"Like what?"

"Depressed."

I stared at him. "What?" I couldn't believe that all of this – the anger and the pushing me away and all of the hurt I'd felt – was the result of your garden variety depression.

He didn't respond and part of me wanted to go over to him and shake him. "Why are you trying to hide from me? Do you really think I don't know what it's like? I've spent half the semester fighting off some level of depression and you were there after my parents fell apart..."

"It's not the same, Clare."

"Well then tell me...what's different about it?"

"I'm bipolar," he reminded me, though I'd obviously never forgotten.

"So?" I didn't mean to be glib but Eli's reticence to explain what was really going on was starting to get to me.

"It means when I'm depressed it's a really big fucking deal."

I was far from an expert on bipolar disorder though when Eli had revealed his condition to me I had done some research on it. "Are you still taking your meds?" I asked, trying to keep my voice even so it didn't sound like I was accusing him of anything.

He nodded.

"Are you still seeing your therapist?"

He nodded again.

"Is she worried about this?"

Eli sighed. "I called her this morning but she asked me the usual questions and decided that this is probably just a temporary low swing and not something to get too alarmed about. I'm not doing too great but I'm not suicidal or anything. I'm going to see her tomorrow just in case though."

"That's good, Eli."

He cringed. "I'd been doing really well."

"Hey," I said softly, leaning closer to him. "Everybody has ups and downs, bipolar or not. It's nothing to be ashamed of." I thought about what the books I had read said. "Even with the meds, your moods aren't going to be completely level. It wouldn't be possible unless you were a zombie all of the time." I remembered how Eli was when he was first diagnosed with anxiety and the meds they had him on were definitely not right. He shrugged. "It sounds to me like you're doing everything right, taking your meds and going to the doctor."

He snorted. "Everything right and I'm still a mess..."

"Eli..."

But he clammed up immediately. "I can't talk about this with you."

I looked him sadly but he wouldn't even meet my eyes. "I'm your girlfriend," I said tearfully.

"And that's exactly why you're the last person I can go to with this stuff."

"You're not making any sense."

He looked away and was silent and I was terrified that he was done, that he was going to shut me out again. But after a long pause, he said, "Last year, I was like this a lot."

I nodded, encouraging him and he kept going. "I don't know why I ever thought that moving to Vancouver was a good idea, but I'm sure I could have made it work. But stupid me made just about every bad decision on earth. I met Kate and fell for her hard, and never bothered to make any other friends. And I didn't like my therapist out there; I just couldn't trust him – but rather than find somebody else, someone I could be honest with, I just pretended that I was doing really well so he'd keep refilling my prescriptions, and he didn't even notice I was faking. And I had to drop French two weeks in because everybody in the damn class was from Quebec and I had no fucking clue what was going on."

Eli looked miserable and I wanted to give him a hug but I didn't want to do anything to interrupt his story, so I just gave him an encouraging look as he continued. "It rained all the fucking time and my roommate was a prick and all I wanted to do was come home. And all I'd let myself do was stay there because in my opinion, being miserable was better than being a failure. So I clung to Kate because she was the only thing good in my life and I spent days in bed feeling worthless. And finally, she told me that I wasn't the guy she thought I was and she broke up with me."

A tear slipped out of his eye. "She dumped me and I had _nothing_."

"Oh Eli," I said softly. I reached for his hand but he pulled it away, and I wanted to sob in frustration. "I'm not Kate," I reminded him. "I'm not going to give up on you just because you're in a bad place."

"Oh yeah?" he challenged, his eyes flashing. "Because I'm pretty sure that's exactly what you did last time we were together."

It all came back. Eli's possessiveness upon Fitz's return. His creepy Gothic Tales story and his insistence that our writing partnership was our destiny. His refusal to leave my side, to let me have some space when I needed it, to accept that just because we wanted different things didn't mean that I was wrong.

Over all these years, I had come to accept that I had done the right thing for both of us by breaking up with him. Eli needed help that I couldn't give him, and it wasn't until he crashed his hearse that his parents took his mental health issues seriously enough to get him the help he needed. But I'd always been haunted by _how_ I'd broken up with him. I'd left him completely alone when he needed me most and even when he continued to go through periods of instability, I'd buried my head in the sand and pretended that he wasn't my problem anymore.

God, it was no wonder Eli was terrified of me seeing him depressed. He'd had three girlfriends and two of us dumped him when he was either manic or depressed and the third _died_. Julia obviously had no say in her tragic demise, but I knew Eli couldn't help but feel abandoned. I knew that the only thing worse than being depressed was being depressed while you felt alone.

"Eli," I began, trying to figure out what I could say to make this better. "I know I screwed up the first time around...but I can't keep apologizing for that. You're just going to have to trust that I'm not a scared fifteen year old girl anymore. And you're not the same guy either. I know it must be hard when you're feeling like this, but you're not completely out of control like you were back then. You've made so much progress and I'm proud of you."

I scooted closer to him on the bed and put my hand on his leg, relieved when he didn't tense up immediately or move away. "I'm here, Eli. I'm not going anywhere. But you can't push me away...it just hurts me and I know it doesn't make anything better for you." I grabbed his hands and looked into his eyes. "I want to be here for you. Just like you've been there for me so many times when I've needed you. But if this is going to work, you have to let me."

He nodded and wiped a tear from his eye, placing his hand back in mine right away. "Okay," he whispered.

"Do you feel any better?" I asked.

He shrugged. "I don't feel much better," he said, and my heart sank. "But I feel a lot less scared."

I felt a little better to hear him say that. I didn't want him to ever be afraid that I was going to leave him. But there were a lot of things we needed to address. "Is there anything in particular that's causing you to feel bad?" He didn't respond right away so I quickly added. "Like when you were talking about Vancouver you mentioned some things that weren't great and I know a lot of them don't apply here. I mean, you're pretty used to the cold weather in Toronto but it doesn't rain all the time here. And I know you're kicking ass in most of your classes."

Eli cleared his throat. "Nothing that specific. I mean, I'm doing well in my classes but the workload is pretty killer. I've had to pull a few all-nighters to get papers done and not getting enough sleep never helps anything."

That was something we could work on. "Maybe we could set up a good study schedule. So you can get your work done without affecting your sleep schedule. And instead of keeping you up so late, we can try to end our dates at a reasonable hour."

A slight smirk formed on his lips. "Yeah because taking away nights of making out with my beautiful half-naked girlfriend is exactly the way to make me less depressed."

I swatted his shoulder in jest but really I was just pleased to see signs of the normal Eli peeking through. "I'm sure we can come up with some sort of compromise."

Eli's smile was short-lived. "My biggest problem is that this is all irrational. I mean, when I look at my life objectively, everything is great. I've got you, and Cece and Bullfrog, and Adam and Fiona...I've got my job and Maureen and the other kids on the program board. I'm so much happier here than I was in Vancouver."

His tone grew somber. "But some days I wake up and I just feel worthless. And nothing I can say to myself makes me feel better."

"You're not worthless," I said emphatically. "Not to me...and not to a lot of other people."

Eli got quiet again and I felt myself empathizing with him just a little too much. I wanted to comfort him but I also kind of needed the same thing for myself.

"Can I hug you?" I asked, desperate for him to say yes.

He held out his arms and I fell into him, curling my legs over his lap to get as close to him as I could in a seated position. I buried my face in his chest and one of his hands came up to stroke my hair.

We stayed there holding each other for a long time and when we finally broke apart, things felt...better. I leaned back in and he met my lips in a brief kiss.

He pushed a strand of curly hair back behind my ear to get it out of my face. "You know, sometimes a change of scenery helps me find a new perspective on things. I've been thinking of getting away for a weekend...my parents have a cottage up in lake country and I haven't been up there in a while. I'm in charge of the show this weekend, but I was thinking maybe the next would work."

I wasn't sure I liked the idea of Eli going off into the woods by himself when he was feeling so terrible but I wanted to be supportive and I figured chances were his mood would improve at least a little in that amount of time. "That might be a good idea."

"If you wanted to...I'd like it if you came with me," he said with a husky voice.

I couldn't help but smile. "I would like that."

He squeezed my shoulder. "I know it's kind of early. But I think I should try to get some sleep."

"Sure," I said. "Do you want me to stay? Or is it easier to sleep when you're not sharing a tiny twin bed?"

He laughed. "It is a little easier when I'm not sharing a tiny twin bed with a girl I'd like to have sex with."

"Eli!" I knew he was mostly joking but he'd never come out and directly said those words before.

"It's true," he smirked.

"Well, then you better get to bed so you can dream about all the sex that you aren't having," I teased, leaning in to kiss him.

"That sounds like a plan."

"And I'll see you tomorrow."

I gave him one more kiss and then stood up to leave. But Eli grabbed my hand and stopped me.

"Thank you," he said. "For not giving up on me."

There were so many sappy responses I could give to that. But I figured it was more important to show him just how serious I was about not giving up on him. So I just repeated, "I'll see you tomorrow...I love you."


	12. It's Coming Down

**DISCLAIMER: I don't own Degrassi or anything else.**

**Twitter: themusiksnob / Tumblr: musiksnob**

**Thanks again for your many lovely reviews! It really keeps me going during this very long Degrassi hiatus.  
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><p>Chapter 12<p>

Over the last week and a half, Eli's mood had really improved. I wasn't sure if it was our conversation or his therapist or him just starting to feel better that was the catalyst, but he was definitely acting like the normal Eli I'd grown used to.

In fact, he was spending the two hour ride up to the cabin singing along with his Ipod and trying to make me laugh. If anyone was acting strangely it was definitely me; I'd respond to his questions and teasing but I was sitting there quietly, trying to focus on driving, my mind in another place.

I kept going over the stuff I'd packed, making sure I hadn't forgotten anything important. Condoms. The birth control pills I'd gotten at health services after my conversation with my mother and been taking ever since. I'd even listened to Alli and purchased a silky black babydoll with red lace around the edges and a matching thong. I'd never bothered to dress up for him in sexy clothes before but I really wanted this night to be special.

I was really nervous, even though I knew that sleeping with Eli was the right decision for me. I knew it was silly since Eli had always made me feel completely comfortable with him whether we were just kissing or taking things farther. But everyone talked about sex like it was this amazing, life altering event and it was a lot to live up to.

I hated to admit it but the specters of Kate and Julia were in my mind and I just kept worrying that I wouldn't be able to live up to his experiences with them. I kept trying to convince myself that as much as Eli loved her and surely enjoyed sleeping with her, it was unlikely that Julia was some sort of super sex goddess at the age of 14. And while I had a feeling Kate was a lot more experienced than me, what they had certainly didn't compare to the feelings that were between Eli and me. Even if the sex they had was mindblowing, I was certain it hadn't touched his heart the way it would for the two of us together.

But even if it was our first time and it would probably be pretty awkward, I had every intention of making this experience amazing. I had even asked Alli for advice since she and Dave had spent two months sleeping together whenever they had the opportunity after their first time on prom night. She gleefully gave me a bunch of tips, even IMing me some really embarrassing gifs for photographic reference. Her main suggestion was giving him a blow job beforehand so that he would last longer. I hadn't wanted to try two new things that I could potentially screw up in one night, so I had tried that for the first time a week ago, much to Eli's surprise and happiness. It had ended up being more enjoyable than I had expected and I was shocked at how much I was looking forward to trying that again.

"What are you thinking about?" Eli asked with a curious grin. "Turn right here."

I knew my face was burning but there was no way I was telling him I was thinking about how much I wanted to suck his…you know what. "Just excited about the weekend away," I sputtered.

"Me too," he agreed. I watched a devious smirk appear on his face. "Though I'm getting really tired. We should probably get to bed early."

I laughed. We had decided after the Ottawa trip that waiting until after rush hour was the best way to go but it was only ten o'clock so clearly Eli's mind was wandering into the same territory as mine.

I pulled into the driveway a few minutes later and we carried our stuff into the small cottage, dumping our duffle bags next to the couch. "Tour?" he asked as I set the groceries we'd picked up on the kitchen counter. "Bathroom," he said, pointing at a closed door. "Guest bedroom," he continued, gesturing to a small room with two twin beds. He grabbed my shoulders and led me to the doorway of the last room. "Our bedroom," he said, leaving a kiss on my neck. "With a giant queen sized bed."

"Ah, we'll be so spoiled," I teased. We didn't spent most nights together at school because it was so uncomfortable to fit two people in a twin bed, but sometimes we just couldn't help ourselves.

He resumed kissing my neck and I shivered at the sensation. He pulled back in alarm. "Are you cold? We keep the heat on just high enough to keep the pipes from freezing. Let me turn it up."

I wanted to protest, but it was pretty chilly, so he crossed the living room to fiddle with the thermostat. I cast one last look at the queen sized bed, nervous again that I didn't know exactly how to broach the subject of sex. The mood seemed to be broken as rather than returning to me, Eli let himself into the bathroom. I decided to unpack the groceries, knowing that the milk and ice cream we'd purchased needed to be refrigerated. I left the non-perishables on the counter since I didn't know where things went in this kitchen and didn't feel right prowling through the cabinets.

He came back over to me, rubbing his hands together. "Sorry about the heat. It might take a little while."

"I guess you'll just have to warm me up," I said suggestively.

"That can be arranged." He tugged on my hand and pulled me to the couch, laying me down before climbing on top of me.

I tried to get lost in his kisses, considering this was exactly what I had hoped this weekend would lead to. But I still couldn't shut my mind off. He started to unbutton my shirt and instead of enjoying the touch of his hands against my bare skin, I kept thinking that this wasn't how this was supposed to go. I wasn't wearing my sexy lingerie and we weren't in the big bed and I wasn't sure how to get us there without being really obvious.

Fortunately, Eli was oblivious to my spinning brain. He tugged his own shirt over his head and pressed himself back down against me, and I decided that even if the first time didn't go exactly the way I had planned, we still had a full weekend to explore each other and try things out.

I was working up the nerve to ask him to move this to the bedroom since there was no way I was going to lose my virginity on a couch, when the front door opened.

"Eli? Why is there a car with an "I love Jesus" bumper sticker outside our cottage?" Bullfrog asked as Eli and I jumped apart. I turned around, trying to button up my shirt before they got even more of an eyeful.

"What are you doing here?" Eli asked, still out of breath.

I turned around to see Cece looking at me with a look of shock on her face. "Clare?"

"Hi," I said softly, wishing a hole in the ground would open up under me so I could escape this nightmare.

"Your mom and I wanted to have a nice romantic weekend getaway. Guess you guys wanted the same," Bullfrog said.

Eli glanced at me guiltily. "Next time I guess I should ask first."

"No matter," Bullfrog said cheerfully. "A family fun weekend sounds just fine to me. How are you doing, Clarabelle? It's been a long time."

"I'm good," I said, stepping closer to Eli as if he would protect me from their confused looks and my own embarrassment. He took my hand and if anything, Cece looked even unhappier.

"So how long has this been going on?" she asked icily. Eli hesitated for a moment, and I realized what I had been missing.

He hadn't told them we were back together.

"Excuse me," I said, trying to keep myself from falling apart in front of them. If I had my car keys in my pocket I would have just driven back to Toronto but I wasn't near my purse and it was too freezing out to hide outside. So I whirled around and locked myself in the bathroom, hoisting myself onto the vanity and covering my face with my hands.

The cottage was small enough that I couldn't miss their conversation even as Eli and his parents lowered their voices. Eli was determinedly sticking up for me and telling them that he was happy but I could hear the hesitation in Cece's voice as she brought up our past and his mental health concerns. Bullfrog seemed to be giving Eli the benefit of the doubt but nothing he said seemed to assuage Cece.

The last thing I heard was Eli muttering, "And now I have to fix this," as he got closer to the bathroom door and I tried to wipe the tears off my face. He jiggled the handle and knocked once he realized I had locked the door. "Clare, come on," he said softly.

I unlocked the door and opened it slightly but I saw his parents watching over his shoulder and I wasn't ready to face them. I backed into the room, taking me seat again on the vanity and Eli just sighed and followed me into the small bathroom, closing the door behind him.

"Look, I know you're upset, but I promise you they'll come around. They loved you when we dated in high school. They just need some time to get used to the idea of me dating again."

"That's not why I'm upset," I said softly.

"What's wrong?"

"I get why they would be nervous that you're dating again…but they should have had almost two months to get used to the idea." He looking down, deliberately avoiding my eyes. "Why didn't you tell them?"

"I wanted to. I just haven't been home since we got together and I wanted to do it in person."

I stared at him. "That's such bullshit. You're really closer with your parents. If this meant something to you, you would have told them."

Eli gaped at me, still not used to the fact that I wasn't as squeaky clean as I was in high school. "Clare, it's not like I'm ashamed of you."

"It feels like it," I admitted.

"I'm not," he said softly, taking my hands. "This has nothing to do with you."

"Then what's with the secrecy?"

He sat down on the edge of the tub and looked up at me. "I know you think of Bullfrog and Cece like they were when we were dating: super laid back, no curfew, no rules. But after I crashed Morty, they got super possessive. Instead of leaving me to my life, all of a sudden they wanted to know where I was and who I was with and did I take my medicine. Any time I came home really happy, they called my therapist to see if I was having a manic episode, and if I was having a bad day – not even depressed but just a fucking bad day, they practically put me on suicide watch."

I remembered during the times Eli hung out with me and Adam when he was in Grade 12 that his parents seemed to call him more often than usual, but I had just chalked that up to him being super close with them – not that they were being overly protective.

"It's one of the reasons I went away to Vancouver," he continued. "I needed to know if I could deal with my illness without them constantly monitoring me. They were really pissed off about it, and then when I came home messed up about Kate and not wanting to go back, it was almost like I had proved them right. And all the progress I had made with them by the end of Grade 12 had just vanished. I stuck it out as long as I could but when Fiona offered to let me stay with her for the summer, I had to get out. And I've only been home once since I moved into the dorm, because even though I'm just across the city, I need that distance from them."

Eli looked miserable and I reached down to put my hand on his shoulder. "It doesn't have anything to do with you, Clare. I just know that they think I shouldn't be in a relationship right now. Especially Cece. No matter how many times I try to explain that Kate didn't cause my depression, they won't believe it. And I know I should have told them, but I just didn't want to have that fight with them, especially since it is about you. You're not just some girl. You're the love of my life. And I hate that you think I'm ashamed of you or that my parents hate you because it just isn't true."

I slid off the vanity and sat down on his lap, pulling him toward me. "I don't think that. But I'm glad you explained, because I was really worried."

He gave me a brief kiss. "I was going to wait until Christmas break. Take a few days and show them how good I'm doing and then tell them. And then once they got over their initial pissed off phase, I was going to have you over for dinner and I knew once they remembered just how amazing you are they would come around."

Somehow I doubted that. "How amazing I was until I abandoned you in the hospital."

"Clare, no," he said softly. "They don't blame you for that. Not even a little bit. Trust me, if anyone understands how difficult it is to have a crazy person in their lives, it's them."

"You're not crazy," I whispered, pulling him closer.

"I know," he said. "So basically, we've got two options: drive back to Toronto and pretend this never happened."

"Or stay here and try to win over your parents?" Neither option sounded particularly appealing especially considering the weekend I was expecting to have.

"We're going to have to face them someday," he said.

"And we might as well not ruin Christmas," I agreed.

"Because that's the most important thing," he smirked.

We got up and Eli poked his head out of the bathroom door. "They must have gone to bed. We can wait to face them tomorrow."

He grabbed our duffel bags and I looked longingly at the master bedroom and its now closed door. We walked into the guest room and I looked at the two twin beds and sighed. Eli didn't seem to notice my disappointment. He whipped off his shirt and took his jeans off, diving under the covers rapidly since it was warmer than it was when we first arrived but still pretty cool in the cottage.

I was glad I had brought a pair of normal pajama pants and an extra t-shirt because there was no way I was wearing sexy lingerie or next to nothing with Eli's parents in the room next door. I rolled my eyes as I noticed that Eli was watching me get undressed. As soon as I was finished, I flipped the light switch next to the door and started to climb into the other bed.

"What are you doing?" Eli asked.

"Going to bed."

"All the way over there?" he whined.

I had been looking forward to sleeping in a comfortable bed this weekend but clearly that wasn't going to happen. "Fine," I said.

Eli held the covers up and I slipped in next to him as he put his arms around me. "Hey, Clare," he whispered. "I love you."

"I love you, too." He leaned in for a kiss and I returned it, not letting him pull away. He drew me in even closer and his legs tangled with mine as our lips met over and over. I couldn't pull away even though I was tired and his parents were in the next room; I just wanted more.

He started to push my shirt up and though I stopped him from removing it completely, I moaned into his mouth as he grazed my breasts with his hands. I hadn't expected things to get this far but I was really turned on so I reached for the hole in his boxer shorts and wrapped my hand around him.

"OHHHHHHHH!"

Eli and I froze in shock. It took me a second to understand what had happened, that the loud moan of pleasure had not come out of my sexy boyfriend's mouth.

It had come through the wall of the bedroom next door.

"Oh my God," Eli muttered in embarrassment and I removed my hand from him when a second, louder moan could be heard. "I can't believe them."

"Don't they know we can hear them?" I whispered.

"They don't care," he said grumpily. "I just can't believe they are this loud with you here."

I realized this must be a regular occurrence at the Goldsworthy house and I felt awful for Eli. I had never heard my parents do anything at all, and Mom and Glen were very discreet. I gave him a sympathetic hug, now that the mood was totally ruined for us.

"Ohhh, yes, fuck me, yeeeessssss," Cece called out and I couldn't take it anymore.

"I'm just gonna…" I gestured to the other bed and jumped into it, holding the pillows over my head to try to block out the noise.

Great. Now not only did I have to convince Eli's parents that he was stable, happy and healthy in his relationship with me but I had to do it knowing way more about their sex life than any person should.

Tomorrow was going to be interesting.


	13. Gamble Everything for Love

**DISCLAIMER: I don't own Degrassi or anything else.**

**Twitter: themusiksnob / Tumblr: musiksnob**

**I'm sorry this took forever. The next chapter is a Christmas chapter and obviously that will be late. Oh well. Hope this was worth it. It's not my favorite overall.**

**There are two chapters coming after this. I have another multi-chapter brewing in my head to write afterwards and there are a few semi-experimental (for me) oneshots I've been thinking about. So don't worry. I haven't given up.**

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><p>Chapter 13<p>

After a fitful night's sleep, I woke up to a loud banging on our bedroom door as Bullfrog stuck his head in. "Eli, Uncle Robbie is sick, so you need to go hunting with me."

I squinted at the alarm clock that sat across the dark room. 5 a.m. Eli groaned. "Come on, Dad. I'm here to spend time with Clare." He pulled the covers back over his head. "And sleep," he mumbled.

Bullfrog pulled the cover back down. "Get your ass out of bed. You still owe me from last time. And Clare's welcome to join us."

Eli sat up and looked at me hopefully but I shook my head. "I don't think so."

He grimaced. "Just let me get dressed."

Bullfrog left and Eli sat down next to me. "Are you sure you don't want to come? Otherwise you're going to be alone with Cece."

That didn't sound any better than hunting. "I'm going to keep sleeping until you get back."

He laughed. "Okay then." He kissed my cheek and pulled on some clothes. I rolled onto my side and tried to get back to sleep.

When I woke up it was almost noon, and I tried to delay getting up as long as possible, knowing that if Eli hadn't come in to wake me up that he hadn't returned from hunting with Bullfrog yet. Eventually my full bladder made sleeping in any longer impossible. I snuck into the bathroom as quickly as I could, deciding to take a shower to fill up more time.

But there was really nothing more I could do, especially when the hot water ran out. I got dressed, dropped my clothes and toiletries in the bedroom and came out to find Cece in the kitchen, chopping onions.

She gave me a short smile when I walked up and handed me the box of Lucky Charms Eli and I had purchased last night. "The boys never remember to bring food when them when they go hunting so they always come home starving. I'd make you something but we'll be having an early dinner."

"Oh, cereal's fine," I said, pouring a bowl full and grabbing the milk from the fridge. "I'm sure whatever you're making will be a lot better than the takeout Eli and I were planning on getting."

She didn't respond, even as I took a seat at the counter across from her. Crap. This was going to be worse than I feared. It was actually a little bit heartbreaking to be rejected by the woman who had accepted me so warmly the first time Eli and I had dated.

There was a time when a fight with my mother had sent me running to their house, forgetting that Eli had plans with Adam that night, and Cece had sat with me for hours, listening to me complain about the divorce and how much parents babied me even though I was fifteen and really responsible. On more than one occasion when Morty broke down in the February snow, she'd trekked out in her pajamas to drive me home so that I wouldn't be late for my curfew. She had even pulled me aside after interrupting a very intense kiss on her living room couch and urged me to come to her if I ever changed my mind about sex so that I could get on the pill and protect myself.

The old Cece would have been peppering me with questions about my classes and the books I'd been reading and my sex life, happy to have me around.

Now she didn't want me anywhere near her son.

"Cece, look..." I said but she held her hand up.

"The walls in this cabin are very thin," Cece began and I suppressed my immediate instinct to respond '_No shit._' "And I heard what Eli said to you last night. I know you must think that Bullfrog and I are being unreasonable and that we're treating Eli like a child. And I know you're thinking that it's _you _that we have a problem with, which couldn't be farther from the truth."

I let out a small sigh but my relief turned out to be short-lived, because she continued, "But that doesn't mean that either of us are happy that Eli is dating again and I don't think that's going to change anytime soon."

I just felt awful - completely hurt and embarrassed and humiliated that a person that I had respected and admired so much thought that the relationship that meant so much to me was a bad idea. Even my parents would never have said something like this to Eli when we dated in high school, though I suspected they might have felt that way.

"I don't understand," I said sadly.

"That's because you're not a mother."

I couldn't believe that Cece was being condescending instead of warm and caring and I knew that I couldn't roll over and take this. Eli might pretend that his parents' opinions didn't mean anything to him but I knew that wasn't true and without them on my side, I could kiss the relationship goodbye before it practically got started.

"Well then explain it to me," I said, in a frosty tone I never would have used with an authority figure, but there was too much at stake for politeness.

Cece sighed. She put down the knife and pushed away the cutting board and took a seat on the stool opposite mine. "It's just...ever since Julia's death, Eli has barely had a moment of peace." I looked at her skeptically. Eli seemed to be handling Julia's death just fine at the moment; he'd even occasionally bring her up unprompted – like when he'd recently mentioned that Julia loved _The_ _Taming of the Shrew_ – which was something he'd never done the first time we were dating.

"For a year, he was in a constant state of grief and then he started hoarding more and more things. We thought switching schools would help him move on and it worked to a point, but there was always something in the way. When he met you, we thought, _Maybe this was it. Maybe this would be what he needed._ And I know you two had a lot of good times together, Clare. I can't tell you how many times he'd get home from school with a grin on his face that I know you put there. But there was always so much drama - with Fitz and the bullying - and then the next thing we knew, he had a complete break down and practically got himself killed."

My eyes welled up with tears remembering that moment. "But it wasn't my fault. He's bipolar."

"I know," she said softly, patting my hand for a second, but moving it away before I could. "And I really and truly don't blame you for any of his actions or for breaking up with him. He was in a really bad place and we didn't even understand what was causing it. It was overwhelming for us to deal with as his parents, as adults. I don't blame you for needing to extricate yourself from the situation."

"It was a long time ago," I defended. "I don't feel that way now."

She ignored my statement. "But after everything...trying different meds and getting him in therapy and keeping a closer eye on his behaviour and moods...he was really in a good place. His whole grade 12 year, he kept himself together and on the right track. His grades improved and he had a bunch of really good friends - including you," she added when she noticed just how unhappy I looked. "It's almost impossible for him to stay completely level moodwise, but that was the time he was the least depressed. He was really in good shape."

Cece gave me a wry smile. "And most importantly, he was single. Because the second he left Toronto and moved in to the dorms at UBC, he met a girl the very first day, fell in love with her, and totally wrecked all the progress he had made."

Eli hadn't told me a lot about his relationship with Kate but I was pretty sure that wasn't exactly what had happened. "I think that's an exaggeration."

"Maybe so, but I don't think it's a coincidence that as soon as he got into a relationship he started having more depressed episodes. He started getting possessive and clingy - which was exactly the kind of behaviour that broke the two of you up."

I felt like Cece was trying to bait me, and I definitely wasn't going to put up with that. "Sure, but it's not like that was the only thing that had changed for him. He moved across the country; he was just started university. It's not an easy transition to make for anyone. I don't have clinical depression but I've had lots of days where I just want to sit and cry and do nothing because it's not easy. I don't think having a girlfriend was the cause of his problems. Maybe getting a little too dependent on Kate wasn't a good strategy but I don't think Eli's the first guy to fall really hard for a girl, really fast. It sounds like a mistake a lot of people make when they start university. And it's been a year and he's not even remotely hung up on her, so I'm not sure their relationship was as significant as you're making it out to be."

It was Cece's turn to look skeptical. "Seriously. The only reason he even told me about her," – _besides wanting me to know he wasn't carrying any STIs_, I finished in my head – "was because he didn't want to have any secrets from me."

She didn't seem convinced and I was feeling completely exasperated. "Besides, that year that Eli was doing really well, he wasn't even single by the end of it. He was pretty much dating Imogen for the last four months or so," I said, proud that I managed to say those words without cringing.

Cece laughed. "Please. They were best friends who watched movies together and occasionally fooled around. It wasn't a relationship."

Her voice softened. "The two of you could never have a casual relationship like that. I know how my son felt about you four years ago, and I can see that he still feels the same way. It's going to get complicated and it's going to get messy and I'm terrified that he's going to fall apart again."

I rolled my eyes. "But all love is complicated and messy sometimes. And no matter how much you want to, you're not going to be able to prevent Eli from falling in love. Not now, and not in the future. Why would you want him to be alone and unhappy? I don't see how that helps him."

She shrugged. "I just don't think he's ready."

"But he's doing really well."

Cece gave me a pitying look. "And _that_ is why I don't think he's either ready to be in a relationship or that you're ready to be in one with him."

"What?" I was glad I didn't have food in my mouth when she said that because I would have spit it out all over the table.

"That's how it works. Eli's in a good place and you convince yourself that everything's fine and you can be with him and you two will just be happy forever. But he's not going to stay that way, Clare. He's going to be battling this for the rest of his life."

"Dammit, Cece," I said, unable to control my frustration. "Don't you think I know that? I'm not getting into this relationship with blinders on. But the difference between you and me is that I still see the real Eli in him. He's not a list of symptoms and warning signs. I mean, two weeks ago he had a depressed swing that he's still not completely out of, but he's doing a lot better – especially the last two days. And it is going to take me some time to get used to that, but I don't expect him to be perfect all the time. All I expect is that he's honest with me about how he's doing and that he doesn't try to push me away. Anything else, we can deal with when it comes."

Cece stared at me. Her face fell. "He didn't even tell me," she said softly.

I looked at the hurt and scared expression that crossed her face and realized that as much as I wanted to think she was unreasonable, Cece was just a mother who was terrified for her only son. I reached over and grabbed her hand and to my surprise, she took it.

"I'm sure he didn't tell you because he didn't want to worry you. He didn't want to tell me either, because he was scared after how Kate messed things up between them and how things ended for us back in high school. But I forced him to talk to me about it, and now I think he's starting to trust me. And I'm sure that if you give him a little bit of space, he'll get back to the point where he trusts you to be there for him without smothering him."

She nodded, blinking a few tears out of her eyes. "I know…I know I need to work on that. It's just so hard to see him in pain."

"If it's any consolation, he's doing really well," I said gently. "As soon as he realized that he was having a problem, he called his therapist, and he's been taking his pills religiously, even when he's feeling really good." A soft smile crept across my face. "He told me his therapist called him his most compliant patient with therapy and the meds. And I think that's because he has so many people in his life that care about him that he doesn't want to screw things up."

Cece didn't respond for a minute and I was afraid that I was wrong and we hadn't made any progress here. So I was shocked when she said, "You know, I always thought Eli was going to marry Julia someday. And after she died, I doubted that there was any girl who'd ever be able to make him so happy." She squeezed my hand. "And then you came along."

I slid off my stool and came around the counter to give her a hug. "Does this mean we have your blessing?"

She smiled. "As long as you promise to give me some grandbabies someday." My eyes widened and she started laughing. "Not for a very long time."

"Maybe someday," I said, blushing as I pictured holding a brand new baby while Eli wrapped his arms around me.

I sat back down and Cece gave me a cheeky grin. "So, have you guys started practicing yet? Or are you still thinking of waiting for marriage?"

I blushed even harder as I thought of the sexy lingerie packed in my bag. "Not quite yet," I admitted. "But um…I'm not planning to wait until marriage anymore."

Her eyes lit up but before she could ask me any embarrassing follow up questions, Bullfrog burst through the front door, grumbling. "Absolutely nothing. Six hours of hunting and Eli didn't even hit one thing."

Eli rolled his eyes as he came in behind him. "I don't see you carrying a dead animal over your shoulder."

He walked over to me, asking how things were with his eyes. I decided to show him wordlessly by throwing my arms around him and pulling him into a deep kiss.

When he pulled back, his eyebrows were raised. "O-kay," he said in confusion.

But over his shoulder I saw Bullfrog giving Cece the same sort of look and she smiled at him and nodded.

"Okay," Bullfrog said cheerfully. "I guess the family fun weekend begins right now."

* * *

><p>By the time we arrived back to campus late the next night, I was family fun-ed out. It had been really fun to catch up with Cece and Bullfrog – who had really made an effort with both me and Eli – but I was looking forward to getting back to my regular, quiet life.<p>

Mom and Glen were getting back from their weekend away the next morning and had said they'd pick up the car when they returned. So we left it in the visitor lot and trekked back across campus.

"Everything okay?" Eli asked. "You've been quiet the whole trip home."

"I'm just tired," I said softly. The weekend was exhausting and I hadn't gotten nearly enough reading done, so I knew I'd have to spend all of tomorrow getting caught up.

Of course there was also the question of telling Eli I was ready to sleep with him that had been looming in my mind. Now that my tailor-made plans had fallen through, I didn't know how to broach the subject. I had wanted everything to be special and now I had no idea how to make it happen.

We reached the fifth floor and I was about to say goodnight to Eli when I realized the blaring music was coming from my own room. I sighed, not wanting to end this weekend by having an argument with Mikayla.

Eli seemed to know what I was thinking. "You could hang out with me. What's one more night together?"

"Maybe for a little while," I said.

"Good," he grinned, pulling me into a hug. "I'm not quite ready to let you go."

He unlocked his door and I dropped my bag at the foot of his bed. The door muffled the sounds from the other side of the hall, but I turned on his laptop so I could play some music to cover the rest of it.

"Did you have a good weekend?" Eli asked, standing nervously near the door.

"Yeah," I said, confused as to why he was asking.

"It's just…it meant a lot to me, that you went away with me and that you put up with my annoying parents, that you're just…you."

I gave him an amused smile. "You're awfully mushy tonight."

He took a step forward and placed his hand on my cheek. "I'm just...happy. You're the best thing that's happened to me in a very long time." Before I could respond, he turned around and started digging around in his bag for his toothbrush and toothpaste. "I'm gonna go get ready for bed. I'm exhausted. Don't go anywhere," he said lightly.

"I won't," I promised.

He grinned at me before leaving. I fell back onto his bed in frustration. Everything was just so perfect between me and Eli right now. Everything but this weekend and the status of my virginity. I'd wanted everything to be special and now it was ruined.

But I glanced around his room and I realized maybe all hope was not lost. This was the room where we'd hung out for the first time in university and reconnected as friends. It was right where I spent a night in his arms when he comforted me after my grandmother's death. It was where we had shared our "first" kiss and gotten back together.

Maybe it could be where we shared one final first.

Impulsively, I hurled myself across the room to lock the door before Eli could return. I started to unbutton my shirt and pulled off my jeans when Eli tried the doorknob.

"Ugh," he groaned and knocked on the door. "You better still be in there. I don't have my key."

"Just a minute," I called, shimmying into the skimpy thong and tying the black lacy babydoll in front of me. I took a deep breath as I gazed into the full length mirror on the back of his door, adjusting my boobs and making sure my hair looked okay. I forced myself to stop fretting over my ever-expanding curves since I knew Eli appreciated the assets that I considered to be flaws. I decided to take one extra moment just to make sure that sleeping with Eli tonight was exactly what I wanted.

It was.

Very carefully, I unlocked the door and opened it slowly, making sure to hide behind it so that anyone passing in the hallway wouldn't see me. Eli stepped in and the look of annoyance on his face immediately changed as his eyes skimmed over me.

"What is that?" he breathed, bringing his hand up to stroke the side of my torso.

I closed the small gap between us, wrapping my arms around his neck, which pressed my body against him. "You asked me if I had a good weekend…and I did but…I kind of thought that we'd get to make love for the first time."

He closed his eyes. "Oh," he said softly. "I thought that might be a possibility but I didn't want to get my hopes up and then my parents came and ruined everything and…" He laughed. "Now I'm rambling."

I moved my hands over his chest. "Do you want to?" I whispered.

He surprised me by picking me up, bridal style and carrying me over to the bed. But instead of lying me down and getting things started, he just sat down and held me on his lap so that I was looking right into his face.

"I want to," he vowed. "I want to more than anything; you have no idea. But I need you to know, that I can wait. If you're not sure, or you need more time, or you want to wait until you're married, I can wait for you."

As much as I appreciated the gesture, I knew that wasn't necessary. "I don't want to wait any longer."

The delicious smirk that immediately captured my lips delighted me and I couldn't help but shriek as he dipped me off his lap and onto his bed. His hands roamed over the silky material, taking time to enjoy both the softness and the access to skin that was typically hidden. In the past, I'd often found Eli's slow pace to be frustrating, but tonight I just lost myself in him, happy that he was dedicated to making me feel sexy and comfortable rather than just getting to the end as quickly as possible.

I had stripped him down to his boxers by the time he got around to untying my top and when I sat up to remove it, I decided it was time to take control. I started kissing down his chest, sliding my hands into the waistband of his shorts and tugging them off. He moaned when my hand cupped him but as soon as I tried to take him into my mouth he pulled on my arm until I stopped, sat up and looked at him.

"That's not a good idea right now."

"But Alli said…" My eyes widened as I realized what had just slipped out of my mouth and he laughed.

"Worried about my stamina, Edwards? Tsk, tsk," he teased. "Look you could get me off now and get me off later, but that's going to require a brief resting period, and that's not really what I'm looking forward to tonight." He leaned forward so his hot breath tickled my ear as his finger slipped between my legs. "I want to come while I'm inside you."

I let out a shaky breath and nodded, unable to respond as he pumped his finger in and out of me. He leaned down over me and continued his strokes, making sure I was completely ready for him as he kissed away my nerves. He pulled the last scrap of fabric off my body and I was about to ask him to get a condom out of my overnight bag, when he started kissing up the inside of my leg. I tensed up because as much as I'd enjoyed the last time Eli had gone down on me, that really wasn't what I wanted for tonight.

"Stop," I commanded and he looked up at me in confusion.

"Everything okay?" Eli looked really worried.

"Yeah, I just…" He still looked so nervous that I knew I needed to reassure him, no matter how embarrassing it was. "I want to come while you're inside me," I admitted, somewhat shocked that something that dirty had come out of my mouth.

But in contrast to my incredibly turned on response, Eli groaned. "Your first time? Great, no pressure there, Clare."

I pulled him into a hug. "Hey, that's not what I mean."

"You know I'm going to do whatever I can to make this good for you, but…that's not necessarily going to be possible."

"It'll be good because I'm with you," I said.

He smiled. "Are you…? Do you…?" he asked nervously, and it was all I could do to nod.

I lay back down on the bed as Eli reached into his nightstand and pulled out a box of condoms. I realized it was already open and I couldn't help but wonder if he had been telling me the truth about the number of girls he had been with.

His eyes followed mine and he paused to put his hand on my stomach reassuringly. "They're new; I just…packed a few in my overnight bag just in case. These were closer."

"Okay," I whispered, immediately placated.

I watched as he rolled the condom down his length and knelt between my legs. I could feel myself tensing involuntarily, expecting his immediate and painful penetration. But he just started kissing me again, rubbing himself against me a little but not trying to get inside immediately. By the time he moved to the right place I was even pressing down against him a little bit, trying to help him in. He slipped inside slowly and though I gasped a little when I felt a small tearing, it didn't end up being as painful as I thought it would be. The stretching and him filling me was a little uncomfortable, but he kept everything slow and easy.

"Is this okay?" he asked, his breathy voice revealing that I had no reason to ask the same question.

"Yeah…thank you," I whispered.

He laughed sweetly. "The pleasure is _all _mine."

But now that some of the initial discomfort had subsided it was starting to feel kind of nice. I was wondering if maybe it would be possible to have a really good first time, despite Eli's skepticism.

"Can we…? I want to try…" I began, trying to be brave but failing.

"Anything you want, Clare."

The look he was giving me made me more confident. "Could we maybe…switch?"

He grinned. "Hell yeah," he said, making me blush at how enthusiastic he was. He pulled out to reverse our positions and I was surprised that I missed him, expecting to be sorer. It was super awkward trying to get him back in with me on top and I had to take him in my hand to find the right angle. Some of the discomfort returned but I just moved slowly until that went away.

As embarrassing as it was to be sprawled out on top of him with my breasts dangling in his face, I had a lot more control over the pace. And since – unlike Eli – I could tell if something hurt me, I was able to speed things up a little, knowing my body was ready for it.

"You feel so good," Eli moaned. "This is amazing."

"Yeah," I said. It did feel good but it hadn't crossed into amazing territory.

He propped himself up on his elbow and reached for my clit with his other hand. I let out a soft "ohh" and he grinned. "I love it when you moan for me."

He took my nipple into his mouth while he continued circling and it felt so good I couldn't help myself. "Eli," I whimpered, grinding myself into his hand to increase the pressure.

Although he had let me take the lead thus far, his hips thrust into mine increasing the pace and we both were panting as we got closer. Eli released first and I was surprised that I could feel him pulsing inside me. But he didn't stop and it took about a minute more for his fingers to bring me to orgasm. After I shook and cried out over him, he grabbed me by my hips to pull himself out of me, but I kept lying on top of him, burying my face in his chest, completely overwhelmed by love and happiness.

A few minutes later he got up to dispose of the condom but we curled up together, not wanting to be apart. He brushed my bangs back off my forehead. "Was that worth waiting for? Was it what you had hoped?" he asked a bit desperately.

"It was everything and more," I said and his face lit up. "I'm actually surprised that it was that good. I guess it's because we love each other so much."

He smiled. "Yeah, that and the fact that I'm a total sex god."

I rolled my eyes. "Don't let it get to your head."

Eli was silent for a few minutes and I just enjoyed the feeling of lying in his arms. "I don't want to freak you out," he began, and I could feel my skin tingling with nerves. "But I'm pretty sure that I could spend the rest of my life with you and be completely and totally happy."

I looked at him – the boy I had known for years, whom I had just given everything to – and realized just how _not_ freaked out I was. "And I'm pretty sure that's exactly what I want."

And of course, Eli couldn't leave the sweet moment alone. "Especially if we get to sleep together on a regular basis."

I rolled my eyes, but honestly, all I could think of was when we would do this again. "I think that can be arranged."


	14. All I Want for Christmas is You

**DISCLAIMER: I don't own Degrassi or anything else.**

**Twitter: themusiksnob / Tumblr: musiksnob**

**Well, we've finally reached the last chapter. I am sorry for the incredibly long delay, but real life is finally starting to get in the way of fanfic writers. Fortunately the incredibly long hiatus is coming to a close, so at least we'll have actual Degrassi soon and hopefully fandom will follow.**

**I've got a lot going on my life right now between being 7 months pregnant, having a month and a half left of work to get lots of loose ends tied, and trying to prepare for the baby. I'm not quitting writing, but I'd definitely expect oneshots over chapter stories and long, long breaks in between. I'm hoping this season will go the way I hope and that Cake will end for real ASAP, Emogen is brief and temporary, and that Eclare will end in a good place – whether they are aback together or not.**

**If anyone is going to the NJ screening on Saturday, I will be there. I'm probably pretty identifiable as the kind of old, pregnant lady, but I will be wearing a nametag of some sort. I am not super outgoing, but I like talking to people, so if you see me and read my fics or my rants, please stop and say hi.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 14<p>

I knew Christmas was going to be different this year. When I was younger, we'd always spend the week between Christmas and New Years in Niagara Falls with Grandma as a family, and then Mom and Dad would go back to Toronto for work and leave Darcy and me for another week of vacation. After the divorce, I had to spend Christmas Eve with Dad, but Mom and I had kept up the tradition of spending a week at Grandma's house, bringing Jake and Glen along last year.

I had hoped that perhaps we could make one last trip down to Niagara Falls, even though I knew it wouldn't be the same without Grandma. But Grandma's house had sold about a month ago, and Aunt Judy had decided that she wasn't up for a traditional family holiday and had booked a cruise to Jamaica. My cousin Christine decided to fly to Vancouver and spend Christmas with her boyfriend's family. Even my Dad had left the city, tearing himself away from work for an uncharacteristic golf vacation in Florida at the request of his latest girlfriend.

So it was just me, Mom, Glen and Jake, spending a non-traditional, really awkward Christmas right here in our house. Except Jake had disappeared a few hours ago without a word – not that it mattered, since neither of us were speaking to each other. Mom was on the couch, her head buried in a book, and Glen was preoccupied with fixing a broken hinge on one of the kitchen cabinets. I'd spent most of the morning hiding out in my room, which still felt like the guest room to me, despite Mom's attempt to fix it up by buying me a double bed and some new curtains.

I felt like I was waiting for Christmas to start. We usually did presents Christmas morning, and I was worried that we weren't going to do anything for the holiday until then. Mom hadn't even mentioned going to the midnight service at our church tonight or the carol sing-a-long that preceded it. The tree was up but it was somewhat halfheartedly decorated; Mom had stuck with the glass balls in red and green and silver rather than our childish homemade ornaments.

Glen's cell phone rang and he answered with a concerned look on his face. But after a brief conversation that was mostly silence on his end, he hung up and shot Mom a thumbs up. "What's that about?" I asked her, but she just shrugged.

Great. It was so fun to be left out of things in your own home. I picked up the scarf I was crocheting as part of Eli's Christmas present and started working on it, knowing that unless I put in a lot of effort over the next two days, I wouldn't have it ready by the next time I saw him. He was always walking across campus without enough warm winter coverings on and it always made me crazy.

I knew it would only get worse next semester, since I had gotten word that the housing department had approved my transfer into Maureen's suite in place of her roommate who was studying abroad. Eli and I would no longer be across the hall from each other, but it was worth it to be done with Mikayla forever. I was pretty sure the move would be a good thing for us, since we spent way too much time together since I was always trying to avoid Mikayla. Now we wouldn't see each other every waking moment but we could make sure that the time we spent together was quality time.

And if it were really freezing out, we could always spend the night together and avoid the cold walk back. Although Maureen had warned us that her suitemates had strict rules about sex noises since one of their roommates last year had been really embarrassingly loud. She didn't seem pleased when Eli's response was, "So I guess Clare will be spending most of her nights in _my_ room."

I couldn't believe that I'd only been home for two days and already I was really missing spending the night with him. I had a feeling once the holidays were over we'd be able to sneak in enough alone time to have sex, but I didn't think even my more tolerant mother was going to let me sleep over his house. I knew I was eighteen and I didn't have to get her permission but I was pretty happy with how close we were getting and I didn't want to rock the boat.

I heard a soft knock on the door and looked up in surprise. Mom poked me in the leg with her sock-covered foot. "Could you get that, Clare?"

I opened the door to find Eli standing on our doorstep. "What are you doing here?" I asked, though I was pleased to see him.

"I'm here to celebrate my first Christmas," he said, wiping the snow off his boots on the mat. He was carrying a huge shopping bag that I could see was filled with gift wrapped presents.

I gaped at him in shock. I didn't even know if we were really doing Christmas today and I knew my mother was not going to be pleased with an unexpected visitor. He laughed at the expression on my face. "Your mom invited me," he explained. "Can I come in?"

"Sure," I said, feeling foolish.

I found Mom and Glen standing behind me. "Hello Eli," Mom said warmly. "It's good to see you."

I watched in confusion as she introduced Eli to Glen and they shook hands. Eli commented on the renovations Glen had done to the living room and kitchen back when he and Jake had first moved back to Toronto, and I realized this was the first time Eli had been in this house since we broke up. I grabbed my mother's arm and hissed. "You invited Eli? Why didn't you tell me?"

She peered at me. "I thought you'd be happy that Eli was here."

"I am…it's just…" I hadn't told her about how Jake had interfered with my relationship with Eli, though I was certain she'd noticed the tense silent treatment we'd been giving each other. "Does Jake know he's coming?"

"I mentioned in a few days ago." She didn't seem to be covering anything so I guessed he was okay with it. "Is there something wrong, honey?"

"I just wish you had told me," I said.

She laughed. "Clare, if I had told you to invite Eli in advance, you would have spent the last few weeks stressing out over it." She pinched my side. "Relax. It's Christmas."

I still hadn't gotten over the fact that my mother, who'd been completely uptight the entire time I'd known her, had seemed to turn over a new leaf since Glen had entered her life. Even though I was certain that she had some hesitance over my relationship with Eli deep down, and even though I had seen her standing in front of the tree, wiping a few tears from her eyes last night, she seemed to be pushing through and trying to get our family through the holidays. I decided to take a page from her book and joined Eli on the couch, sitting close to him and pulling his hand into mine.

He and Glen clammed up as soon as I sat down and I wondered what they had been whispering about. I was a little annoyed at all the secrecy this morning, especially since Eli seemed to know more about what was going on than I did.

Mom was quizzing Eli about the classes he'd taken this semester when I heard Jake's truck pull up outside. I tensed automatically, knowing that Jake lacked the same tact as our parents, and Eli rubbed my back reassuringly.

"We're home," Jake called as he opened the door. Before I could process the fact that "we" was a very strange pronoun for my eternally single stepbrother to use, a girl I hadn't seen in over four years walked through the door.

My sister, Darcy.

Suddenly it didn't matter that she had missed Grandma's funeral or Mom and Glen's wedding or my last four birthdays and high school graduation. Because she was here now. We all stood to greet her but I reached her first, throwing my arms around her in the sisterly hug I hadn't realized how much I'd missed. She spun me around a little and we were both laughing and crying and I knew Mom probably wanted to greet her long lost daughter but I really just didn't want to let her go.

Over Darcy's shoulder (which required standing on my tiptoes since I had never caught up to my lanky sister in height) I could see Mom beaming at us, a few tears trickling down her own face. I also saw Jake extend his hand to Eli, the two of them coming to some silent peace treaty.

Darcy finally pulled back, grabbing my hands. "Look at you," she gushed. "You're all grown up."

"You look exactly the same," I said. The only thing different about her was the baggy sweatshirt she'd clearly swiped from Jake since she probably didn't have any clothes in Kenya that were warm enough for a cold Toronto winter.

"You've got boobs now," she teased, causing me to turn purple. And if that weren't bad enough she turned to Mom and said, "Where did those come from?"

Mom laughed. "Blame Grandma Edwards. She sure didn't get them from me."

I realized that considering I'd shared a room with Darcy for fourteen years and dated both Eli and Jake, that Glen was the only person in the room who hadn't actually seen my boobs and that it made this an even more embarrassing topic of discussion. "Can we talk about something else?"

Darcy laughed and let me go so she could hug Mom. I sat back down next to Eli who was grinning at me. "Did you know about this?"

He nodded. "Originally they were going to have me pick her up from the airpot. But her flight got delayed and Jake could do it so your mom figured that might be a better plan considering she had actually met Jake before."

Seriously? "Conspiring with my family, Eli?" I shook my head.

He squeezed my shoulders. "I think the surprise was worth it."

"Yeah, it was," I admitted.

We gathered in the living room, Eli and I curling up together at the end of the couch. Darcy caught us up on the details of her four day's journey back to Toronto. Mom and Glen peppered with her questions about her living situation and the work she'd been doing. I felt really terrible that I had let my bitterness at Darcy for leaving and never coming back get in the way of our relationship; we had emailed quite a bit for the first year after she was gone but when things went south with our parents I had pulled back from her and never quite caught up in the following years.

Darcy's stories went on for quite a while and I could feel Eli getting restless. "You okay?" I whispered.

"Yeah," he said. "I was just wondering when we get to open presents."

I giggled. Eli looked so excited about the prospect that I hated to burst his bubble. "We usually do presents Christmas morning," I explained. "But you and I could exchange them later if you want – in private."

Apparently our conversation had caught the attention of the rest of the family. "What exactly did you get Eli that you can't give him in front of us?" Jake asked, his voice teasing rather than overprotective.

"Nothing," I said, my cheeks flushing. "I just didn't want you guys to feel left out."

"I've got presents for everybody," Eli said cheerfully. "No reason not to open them now."

"Eli, you didn't have to do that," Mom said generously.

"Yeah, you really didn't," I said. But the look on his face told me he wasn't budging. "Let me go get yours."

I ran up to my room to get the other half of Eli's present, which I had fortunately wrapped last night with the rest of the presents for my family. I returned to the living room to find Darcy planting a Santa hat on Eli's head as he passed out presents.

"Who goes first?" he asked eagerly.

I was about to respond, but Mom cut in. "Well, tomorrow youngest goes first, so I think tonight we should do oldest to youngest." She shook the large package on her lap as if she was trying to guess what was inside.

"That's a joint present," Eli explained. "For you and Mr. Martin."

"Call me, Glen," he said, as Mom ripped open the package.

It was a large wicker picnic basket. "This is lovely, Eli."

He beamed. "Clare told me how much you guys like to spend weekends at your lakehouse and my family and I always used to go on picnics near our cottage, when the weather was nice. There are some cookies inside that Cece baked that you might not want to save for spring, but the wine will still be good."

"The wine'll be gone before the cookies," Glen joked.

"Thank you, Eli," Mom said, rolling her eyes at her husband.

Darcy started ripping open the package that was nearly the same size as Mom's picnic basket. "A case of mac and cheese?" she said, her eyes widening.

"I had a cousin in the VSO who spent two years in Tanzania. The only thing he wanted to eat when he got home was mac and cheese."

Darcy looked like she was going to rip the case open immediately. "What time is dinner?" Mom reassured her that it would be soon.

Jake held up the ring sized box that Eli had given him. "Are you sure this one isn't for Clare?"

"No man, it's all you."

It didn't surprise me that Eli was trying to butter up my mother and my sister, but I couldn't believe after everything that had happened that he had bought a Christmas present for Jake.

Jake unrolled a small scrap of paper from inside the box. "Britney. And a phone number?"

"She's in one of my classes. She builds sets for the school plays. I think you two would hit it off." Eli scrolled through a few photos on his phone and held it up to Jake.

"Sweet," he said, looking impressed for the first time. "I just might have to call her."

Eli looked at me expectantly and I handed him my gift. "You're older."

I watched nervously as he opened it. I was started to feel a little inadequate. He had somehow managed to find the perfect presents for my family whom he barely knew, and I wasn't sure how my gift would measure up.

"Cool," he said, reading the back cover of the new Paolo Baciagalupi novel I had gotten him. "I forgot this was coming out."

"Open it up," I offered, not wanting him to think that was his only present.

He cracked open the cover and found the ticket to the Foo Fighters concert I had gotten him for the last weekend of our winter break. His eyes lit up. "Oh my God, Clare, this is awesome." He threw his arms around me. "Only one ticket though; does that mean you're not coming with me?"

"The other one's Adam's present. I figured the two of you would have a better time without me."

"Never," he said, looking at the tickets again. "He's going to be so psyched. Thanks."

Eli handed me a small, flat package that weighed almost nothing. I opened it gingerly, preferring to undo the tape rather than rip the paper open. I found a piece of printer paper inside and unfolded it to discover a plane reservation from Toronto Pearson to JFK that was scheduled to leave in just a few days. I blinked at the unexpected gift, trying to process exactly what this was for.

"Fiona invited us to spend New Years in New York City…if you want to go," Eli rushed to add. "I got refundable tickets though, so if you want to go but not this week or if you'd rather go somewhere else, or I can just get my money back and I can get you something else, like a necklace or something. Whatever you want."

Eli was talking so fast and rushing to placate me, and I realized that this was probably his way of making up for the last time he'd tried to surprise me with a trip to the gothic fiction convention. But this time we were in a really good place in our relationship and the surprise was a very welcome one.

There was only one problem… "Darce," I asked hesitantly. "When are you leaving?"

She laughed. "I'm scheduled to take the GED on January 20th and my return flight isn't for two weeks after that. We'll have plenty of time to hang out once you get back."

I turned to Eli and threw my arms around him, much like he'd done to me moments before. "We won't have to spend New Years freezing our buns off in Times Square, will we?"

He laughed. "If I know Fiona, the Coynes will be throwing an epic, climate-controlled celebration, the likes of which we'll never experience again."

I couldn't help but grin and lean in for a kiss despite the audience. But when I pulled back, I saw my mother's wary look and realized that maybe I should double check about this impromptu plans. "It's okay that I go, right?"

Glen patted Mom's knee and she let out a sigh. "Of course, Clare. You're eighteen and in university and I couldn't stop you even if I wanted to." She gave me a half-hearted smile. "It sounds like a nice trip though. Remind me to dig out your passport tomorrow; I think it's in the filing cabinet that we moved to the basement when we cleared out your room."

"Thanks, Mom," I said. "And thank you, Eli, for all these lovely presents."

The whole family echoed my sentiments. Mom got up to start cooking dinner and Darcy joined her, chattering about all of the food she wanted to make sure she got to eat while she was back in Toronto. Jake turned on the TV and started flipping through channels, finally settling on a classic hockey game.

I turned to Eli, not sure what he'd want to do. He leaned in and kissed my check. "Go catch up with your sister."

"You sure?"

He rolled his eyes. "I can handle watching hockey for a little while."

"Ookay," I said.

I went into the kitchen and bumped Darcy on the shoulder before I grabbed a large bowl to start making a salad. "I was just telling Mom that I can't believe how cute Jake Martin ended up being," she said.

"Just remember he's your stepbrother," I cautioned and Mom grimaced at me.

"Ewww, I'm not interested in him. For a whole lot of reasons," she said emphatically.

"Reasons like Michael?" Mom teased.

I looked at Darcy wide-eyed. "Who's Michael?"

She looked embarrassed. "This guy I'm…I don't know what with."

"Oh really?" I said. I wondered why Mom had more knowledge of him than I did.

"It's nothing serious…but I think it could be." Darcy's smile grew. "We're going to try to Skype a bunch while I'm out here. Hopefully he'll have power and his connection won't drop. I'm excited to be here, but I am really going to miss him."

"That's great, Darce." In the first year after she'd gone away, back when we still kept in good contact, she'd been so traumatized by her past that she was afraid to get close to any guys. It was nice to see she'd started to open herself up to a relationship again.

"You and Eli seem to be doing well," she commented. I glanced into the living room but all three guys were glued to the TV. "And he's cuter than I'd thought he'd be."

"What's that supposed to mean?" I asked.

"Just from everything I've heard about him, he never quite seemed like your type. But now that I've seen you together, I can see why you like him so much."

I surmised everything she'd heard about him had pretty much come from my mother, probably the first time he and I had dated. "Don't believe everything you hear," I said.

Mom turned around to pop the lasagna into the oven and Darcy grabbed my left hand. "Oh my God," she breathed, trying to keep her voice down despite her excitement. "Are you two…?" she gestured between us while grabbing the empty finger where my purity ring once sat.

I glanced over at Mom and realized that though she was trying to look busy while putting away the oven mitts that she knew exactly what we were talking about. But after the conversation we'd had on the way back from Niagara and the times we'd spent together since then, I knew I didn't have to hide the truth from her.

"We are," I confirmed, and Darcy's resulting squeal attracted the attention of the male contingent in the living room.

"Sorry!" she said, and they went back to their game. "I want details," she hissed in my ear. "I may be waiting for marriage before I…you know…again but if my baby sister is doing it, you need to tell me everything."

Mom cleared her throat and Darcy's face fell. "All we need to know is that Clare is being safe and that she's happy."

"And I am…on both accounts." Darcy looked disappointed, so I mouthed the word "Later" to her.

Mom brushed her hands on her apron. "I forgot the pie recipe on the printer. Let me run up and get it."

"Sorry," Darcy whispered. "I didn't mean to out your sex life to Mom."

I shrugged. "She pretty much knew anyway. Surprisingly, she's been pretty cool about it."

She smiled. "Yeah, she and I have been emailing a lot. Ever since Grandma…" her voice trailed off. "I felt awful I couldn't make it home. That's why I made sure I could be here for Christmas – and with the stupid travel delays, I almost missed that too."

"You're here. That's all that matters."

"Mom seems really happy. I think Glen's good for her."

I glanced over at my stepdad. "He really is. Have you talked to Dad at all?"

She groaned. "Not really. That'll be fun to deal with once he gets back."

I squeezed her shoulder. "As long as you realize that we're all better off now, it'll be okay. I don't really blame him for what happened. The divorce sucked, but it was a long time ago, and you missed the worst of it. Just be glad that he's still in our lives."

Darcy hugged me. "I've missed you, Clare."

Mom reentered the kitchen brandishing her printout. "Stop it, you two. This is supposed to be a happy holiday."

"Sorry, Mom," we both said at the same time and then broke into giggles.

"So Darcy, how successful do you think your group has been in terms of conversions?" Mom asked, and I knew that was my cue to exit. I'd always been supportive of Darcy's work in helping build schools or wells, but I was a strong believer that faith was personal and while it was okay to share it with people who were curious or interested, it was of questionable morality to impose your views on others, particularly when you held a lot of power in terms of desperately needed aid. I went back into the living room and plopped myself onto Eli's lap.

"Hey," he grinned, pulling me closer.

I could see Jake giving us a wary look, and I wondered if he was going to give us a hard time, but he turned back to the TV and ignored us. We continued to watch the game – well, I pretended to watch while secretly relishing the feeling of Eli caressing my hand – until Mom called us in to dinner.

Eli took the seat next to me as we started passing the dishes around, taking helping servings of the steaming food. "So Eli," Mom asked. "What are your parents doing for the holiday?"

He shrugged. "Chinese food and a movie. Same as any other year."

"That's an interesting tradition," she commented, as she spooned lasagna onto Jake's plate.

Eli laughed. "Not for Jews."

Mom looked momentarily surprised and for a second, I wondered if having a culturally Jewish boyfriend was actually worse in her mind than dating an atheist, but she recovered quickly. "Who'd like to say grace?"

Darcy volunteered to start and we all held hands, even Eli and Jake which almost made me giggle. Her prayer was brief and focused on the fact that she was happy to reunite with her family. Eli squeezed my hand, and I realized that this was really different than the last time Eli had shared an awkward meal with my nearly divorced parents. This wasn't just a casual high school relationship; he was part of the family now.

Dinner was a rousing success as Darcy mostly entertained us with stories about language barriers and really inept volunteers. Glen and Mom gave Eli and I a list of things we should do while we were in New York, since they had spent a week there the year before. The food was delicious – especially when compared to dorm food – and Eli kept squeezing my knee under the table. He seemed totally comfortable talking to my family, and I was ecstatic that things were going so well. My mother had been right – if I'd known Eli was coming, I would have worried about this dinner for days. But everything really seemed to be working out.

By the end of the night, Darcy had passed out on the couch as the rest of us ate as much of the dessert as our stuffed bodies could take.

Glen poked Jake. "Darcy looks like she's out for the night, but tomorrow you're giving her your room."

"I've got a queen sized bed," Jake said. "She could stay with me."

Eli gave him a weird look. "Your attraction to your stepsisters is really unhealthy."

Jake laughed. "Hey, Clare and I broke up like a year before they got married. Totally not weird at all."

"But just weird enough that you'll be sleeping on the couch for the next month," Glen said firmly.

Jake groaned. "She can't share with Clare?"

"Learn to be a gentleman, Jake. The girl has spent half of her time in Kenya living in mud huts. You can suffer on the couch for a month," Glen said.

Jake rolled his eyes but didn't protest.

"More eggnog, Eli?" Mom offered.

"Oh no, Mrs. Martin," he said, despite the fact that Mom had asked him to call her Helen at least twice. "If I'm going to drive home sometime tonight, I should switch to coffee."

"You can stay here if you need to," Mom said.

Eli opened his mouth to decline but Jake interrupted. "The couch is already taken."

"Clare has a double bed," Mom said, shocking all of us.

"Seriously?" Jake cried. "Clare gets to have Eli stay over? If I wanted to bring a girl home for the night, there's no way you guys would go for that."

"That's because Clare knows Eli's last name," Glen deadpanned.

Jake muttered something that sounded a lot like "Bullshit." But neither of our parents changed their position and I noticed Eli poured himself another glass of eggnog out of the doctored pitcher. I was really pleased that I'd get a chance to spend Christmas night in his arms.

Glen held up his glass. "I propose a toast. To our reunited family…"

Mom raised her glass as well. "To a healthy and happy new year."

Jake rolled his eyes. "To lots and lots of eggnog."

I grinned. "To Eli's first Christmas."

He locked eyes with me. "The first of many."

We clinked glasses. "So does this mean I get to have my first Hanukkah next year?" I asked.

Eli laughed. "We're not that big on the celebrating, but I'm pretty sure Cece'll make you some latkes if you ask nicely."

Mom yawned and stretched her arms over her head. "It's been a really long day. I don't think I can make it to midnight service. What do you say we call it an early night? Get up early tomorrow, do presents and breakfast and make it to the 10 a.m. service tomorrow."

Jake didn't look thrilled about going to church tomorrow but I readily agreed. There was no way I was dragging Eli to service and I didn't really want to leave him tonight.

Mom and Glen said their goodnights and Eli excused himself to call Cece and let her know he was spending the night. I looked at Jake, wondering what he thought of all this.

I was surprised to see him looking so serious and even more surprised when he led off with an apology. "I'm sorry I tried to interfere with you and Eli. He's not the crazy guy I thought he was in high school. As long as you're happy with him, I'm okay with it."

"Thanks Jake," I said, standing on my tip toes to give him a hug.

He squeezed me a little tighter. "And if he hurts you again, I'm gonna kick his ass."

I shook my head. "I don't think that will be necessary."

"You know, you should really thank your mom. Helen was the one who tried to get me on board with Eli." I looked at him in surprise. "I don't know what's up with her lately, but she's been pretty cool."

It took me a second but I realized what had most likely happened. "Her mom died. That kind of puts things in perspective." He nodded and I knew he was thinking of his own mother, who'd left after the divorce and never tried to be a part of his life. "Plus your dad is a good influence on her."

Eli came back into the room. "I'm all set. Ready for bed?"

Jake grimaced for a second, but recovered quickly. "You need to borrow something to sleep in or anything?"

It took a moment but we all laughed at the absurdity of my super tall stepbrother offering to share clothes with Eli who was only a few centimetres taller than I was. "I've got a pair of pajama pants I stole from your dorm," I admitted.

Jake didn't look all that thrilled about that either. "Well good. Just don't sleep naked. That's my little sister after all."

I socked Jake in the arm. "Dumbass." I grabbed Eli by the hand and led him upstairs.

Of course once we made it into my room and I shut the door Eli immediately started kissing me. "Stop," I protested, though I really wish I didn't have to. "My parents are home."

"Aww, come on Clare," he teased. "Haven't you ever dreamed about fucking me in your childhood bed?"

My eyes fluttered shut at that image, but I knew I couldn't give in. "First of all, this isn't even my childhood bedroom. And the bed is brand new. And that fact that you're even allowed in here at all, let alone for a sleepover, is still mind-boggling to me, so let's not do something that's going to make them not trust us."

Eli pouted but I could tell it was just a show. I handed him the pants I had stolen and he put them on without a word, and managed to let me change without commenting or trying to grope me.

We lay down next to each other on the bed and Eli curled up into my body. "So you're really excited about the New York trip?" he asked a little nervously.

"Really, really excited," I said. "I'm not sure I have a dress fancy enough for a Coyne New Years Party though."

He laughed. "Oh don't worry. Fiona loves shopping. She'll find you something."

I tried to focus on our impending trip, but my mind kept going back through today's events. "Thanks for spending Christmas with my family. I'm really glad my mom invited you."

"Me too," he said. "I'm glad I could be here for you."

I snuggled deeper into Eli's arms and realized just how lucky I was. We'd gotten to the point where I knew we'd be there for each other; it wasn't even a question.

"Are you sure you don't want to have a quickie?" he teased. "We can be very, very quiet."

I rolled my eyes. "You know how hard that is for me."

"That's what she said."

I giggled and rolled on top of him, tickling him on his sides to punish him for his joke. He tried to fight back and the bed made a huge squeaking noise that probably could have woken up the whole block. We pulled back from each other and lay down quietly, hoping that my mother wouldn't come in brandishing a broom.

After a few minutes when we were certainly the coast was clear, Eli leaned toward me. "You know, the guestroom at Fiona's is in a whole other wing from where she and her family stay. It's practically in another zip code."

"Sounds…nice," I said, leaning over and giving him a quick peck on the lips.

"Sounds perfect," he whispered, and then he let his kisses take over.

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><p><strong>I have very tentatively turned anonymous reviews back on. Please be nice and don't ruin that for others by being an asshole. <strong>


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